Daniel Harsono

(National Tsing Hua University)

Disks are sites of planet formation. Young disks tend to be more active meaning that their transport rate is higher than the older disks. The dominant physical mechanism of this transport is generally related to the magnetic field strength of the disk. Recent observations, however, have shown that the gas in young disks has a low ionization rate. Such a low ionization rate means that the gas flow around the young disk is not coupled to the magnetic field.

In this project, the student will work on observations of molecular lines toward embedded protostars (1-2). With these data, we can estimate the ionization fraction of the gas and the cosmic ray rate on the disk. The student will learn how to check the quality of the ALMA data and the basics of star and planet formation.