Title ASASSN-24fw: candidate gas-rich circumsecondary disk occultation of a main-sequence star
Authors Zakamska, Nadia L ; Pallathadka, Gautham Adamane ; Bizyaev, Dmitry ; Merc, Jaroslav ; Owen, James E ; Reggiani, Henrique ; Schlaufman, Kevin C ; Bąkowska, Karolina ; Bednarz, Sławomir ; Bernacki, Krzysztof ; Gurgul, Agnieszka ; Hall, Kirsten R ; Hambsch, Franz-Josef ; Joachimczyk, Barbara ; Kotysz, Krzysztof ; Kurowski, Sebastian ; Liakos, Alexios ; Mikołajczyk, Przemysław J ; Pakštienė, Erika ; Pojmański, Grzegorz ; Popowicz, Adam ; Reichart, Daniel E ; Wyrzykowski, Łukasz ; Zdanavičius, Justas ; Żejmo, Michał ; Zieliński, Paweł ; Zola, Staszek ; Bednarz, Slawomir ; Mikolajczyk, Przemyslaw J ; Wyrzykowski, Lukasz ; Zejmo, Michal ; Zielinski, Pawel
DOI 10.3847/1538-3881/ae1fd9
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Is Part of The astronomical journal.. Washington : American Astronomical Society. 2026, vol. 171, iss. 2, art. no. 95, p. 1-21.. ISSN 0004-6256. eISSN 1538-3881
Abstract [eng] Dusty disks around planetary and substellar companions in outer reaches of exoplanetary systems can be detected as long-lasting occultations, provided the observer is close to the secondary’s orbital plane. Here we report optical spectroscopy with KOSMOS (Apache Point Observatory), MagE (Magellan), and GHOST (Gemini-S) of ASASSN-24fw (Gaia 07:05:18.97+06:12:19.4), a 4 mag dimming event of a main-sequence star which lasted 8.5 months. We discover multiple low-ionization metal emission lines with velocity dispersion ≲ 10 km s −1 blueshifted by 27 km s −1 with respect to the star, as well as kinematically complex Na D absorption. If associated with the occulter, these detections suggest that the occulter is gas rich. Further, we detect a blueshifted and broad (∼200 km s −1 ) H α line, which likely originates in the inner circumstellar disk. We confirm the previously reported occultations in 1981 and 1937 seen in historic data, yielding a semimajor axis of the occulter’s orbital motion around the star of 14 au. If the occulter is a circumsecondary disk filling 30%–100% of the Hill radius, we estimate the minimum mass of the secondary to be a few Jupiter masses and a disk mass of 1% of the mass of the Moon. Given the age of the star (>2 Gyr), the disk is unlikely to be a survivor of the planet formation stage and may be the result of a planetary collision. If the Na D absorption and/or metal emission lines originate in the disk, the observations presented here are the first discovery of a circumsecondary disk wind or rotation.
Published Washington : American Astronomical Society
Type Journal article
Language English
Publication date 2026
CC license CC license description