Abstract
ABSTRACT Massive stars are strong sources of far-ultraviolet radiation that can be hostile to the evolution of protoplanetary discs, driving mass-loss by external photoevaporation and shortening disc-dissipation time-scales. Their effect may also reduce the time-scale of angular momentum exchanges between the disc and host star during the early pre-main-sequence phase. To improve our understanding of the environmental influence on the rotational history of stars, we developed a model that considers the influence of the local far-ultraviolet radiation on the spin evolution of low mass stars. Our model includes an assumption of disc locking, which fixes the rotation rate during the star-disc-interaction phase, with the duration of this phase parametrized as a function of the local far-ultraviolet radiation and stellar mass (in the range of 0.1–1.3 M⊙). In this way, we demonstrate how the feedback from massive stars can significantly influence the spin evolution of stars and explain the mass dependence observed in period-mass distributions of young regions like Upper Sco and NGC 2264. The high far-ultraviolet environments of high-mass stars can skew the period distribution of surrounding stars towards fast-rotation, explaining the excess of fast-rotating stars in the open cluster h Per. The proposed link between rotation and the pre-main-sequence environment opens new avenues for interpreting the rotational distributions of young stars. For example, we suggest that stellar rotation may be used as a tracer for the primordial ultraviolet irradiation for stars up to ∼1 Gyr, which offers a potential method to connect mature planetary systems to their birth environment.
Highlights
To improve our understanding of the environmental influence on the rotational history of stars, we developed a model that considers the influence of the local far-ultraviolet radiation on the spin evolution of low mass stars
Our model includes an assumption of disk-locking, which fixes the rotation rate during the star-disk-interaction phase, with the duration of this phase parametrised as a function of the local far-ultraviolet radiation and stellar mass
4.1.5 Distribution of low mass stars in the neighbourhood of massive stars In Section 3.4 we examined the influence of massive stars on the spin evolution of low-mass stars in their vicinity by looking at samples of equal-mass stars distributed in a Plummer sphere around single massive stars
Summary
Over the last couple of decades, a growing number of studies have been exploring the influence of the environment on the evolution and dissipation of protoplanetary disks (e.g., Bally et al 1998; Johnstone et al 1998; Adams et al 2004; Adams 2010; Facchini et al 2016; Nicholson et al 2019; Haworth & Clarke 2019; Sellek et al 2020; Parker et al 2021). A number of studies have observationally explored the indirect consequences of external photoevaporation of disks, such as the study of proplyd objects in the neighbourhood of massive stars (Smith et al 2003; Balog et al 2006; Rigliaco et al 2009; Wright et al 2012; Mann et al 2014; Guarcello et al 2014; Kim et al 2016; Haworth et al 2021) and variations of the disk-fraction and disk-masses of stars in External photoevaporation of disks will shorten the star-diskinteraction (SDI) phase During this phase, the magnetic interaction between stars and their accretion disks leads to an exchange of mass and angular momentum between the two (e.g., Ghosh & Lamb 1979; Koenigl 1991; Ireland et al 2021). In this theoretical equilibrium state, the rotation rate of the star is dictated by a balance of torques, which is determined by Period (days) data 5-th perc. data 50-th perc. data 95-th perc. break-up limit
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