Dust morphology under changing dust mass ratios in protoplanetary discs

Journal article

Protoplanetary disc mass is one of the most fundamental properties of a planet-forming system, as it sets the total mass budget available for planet formation. However, obtaining disc mass measurements remain challenging, since it is not possible to directly detect H, and CO abundance ratios are poorly constrained. Dynamical measurements of the disc mass are now possible, but they are not suited to all discs since the measurements typically require well-behaved emission surfaces. A long-standing method is to obtain continuum flux measurements from the dust emission, and convert to a total disc mass by assumption of the dust-to-gas mass ratio, . This quantity is poorly constrained in protoplanetary discs. We investigate the impact of on the morphology of planet-containing hydrodynamical simulations of dusty protoplanetary accretion discs, and suggest that if a planet mass estimate can be obtained, then disc morphology could be used to constrain in observed systems relative to each other, improving the total disc mass estimates of protoplanetary discs.

Authors: Murray, MH; Hall, C; Baehr, H; Terry, JP

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Journal: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
• Volume: 547
• Issue: 2
• Pages: stag096
• Article number: stag096
• Publication date: 2026-01-19
• Acceptance date: 2026-01-12
• DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stag096
• EISSN: 1365-2966
• ISSN: 0035-8711
• Language: English
• Keywords: Protoplanetary Discs; Hydrodynamics; Planet-Disc Interactions