arXiv subjects

Shangjia Zhang

Publications and source records attributed to Shangjia Zhang.

36 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

Impact of Differential Dust Settling on the SED and Polarization: Application to the Inner Region of the HL Tau Disk

The polarimetric observations on the protoplanetary disk around HL Tau have shown the scattering-induced polarization at ALMA Band 7, which indicates that the maximum dust size is $\sim 100~{\rm μm}$, while the Spectral Energy Distribution (SED) has suggested that the maximum dust size is $\sim$ mm. To solve the contradiction, we investigate the impact of differential settling of dust grains on the SED and polarization. If the disk is optically thick, longer observing wavelength traces more interior layer which would be dominated by larger grains. We find that, the SED of the center part of the HL Tau disk can be explained with mm-sized grains for a broad range of turbulence strength, while $160~{\rm μm}$-sized grains can explain barely only if the turbulence strength parameter $α_{\rm t}$ is lower than $10^{-5}$. We also find that the observed polarization fraction can be potentially explained with the maximum dust size of $1~{\rm mm}$ if $α_{\rm t}\lesssim10^{-5}$, although models with $160~{\rm μm}$-sized grains are also acceptable. However, if the maximum dust size is $\sim3~{\rm mm}$, the simulated polarization fraction is too low to explain the observations even if the turbulence strength is extremely small, indicating the maximum dust size of $\lesssim1$ mm. The degeneracy between 100 ${\rm μm}$-sized and mm-sized grains can be solved by improving the ALMA calibration accuracy or polarimetric observations at (sub-)cm wavelengths.

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arXiv2021

A search for companions via direct imaging in the DSHARP planet-forming disks

The "Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project" (DSHARP) has revealed an abundance and ubiquity of rings and gaps over a large sample of young planet-forming disks, which are hypothesised to be induced by the presence of forming planets. In this context, we present the first attempt to directly image these young companions for 10 of the DSHARP disks, by using NaCo/VLT high contrast observations in L'-band instrument and angular differential imaging techniques. We report the detection of a point-like source candidate at 1.1" (174.9 au) for RU Lup, and at 0.42" (55 AU) for Elias 24. In the case of RU Lup, the proper motion of the candidate is consistent with a stationary background contaminant, based on the astrometry derived from our observations and available archival data. For Elias 24 the point-like source candidate is located in one of the disk gaps at 55 AU. Assuming it is a planetary companion, our analysis suggest a mass ranging from $0.5 M_J$ up to $5 M_J$, depending on the presence of a circumplanetary disk and its contribution to the luminosity of the system. However, no clear confirmation is obtained at this stage, and follow-up observations are mandatory to verify if the proposed source is physical, comoving with the stellar host, and associated with a young massive planet sculpting the gap observed at 55\,AU. For all the remaining systems, the lack of detections suggests the presence of planetary companions with masses lower than $5M_J$, based on our derived mass detection limits. This is consistent with predictions of both hydrodynamical simulations and kinematical signatures on the disk, and allows us to set upper limits on the presence of massive planets in these young disks.

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arXiv2020

Imaging the Dusty Substructures due to Terrestrial Planets in Planet-forming Disks with ALMA and the Next Generation Very Large Array

We present simulations of the capabilities of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and of a Next Generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) to detect and resolve substructures due to terrestrial planets and Super-Earths in nearby planet-forming disks. We adopt the results of global 2-D hydrodynamical planet-disk simulations that account for the dynamics of gas and dust in a disk with an embedded planet. Our simulations follow the combined evolution of gas and dust for several thousand planetary orbits. We show that long integrations (several tens of hours) with the ngVLA can detect and spatially resolve dust structures due to low-mass rocky planets in the terrestrial planet formation regions of nearby disks (stellocentric radii $r = 1 - 3$ au), under the assumption that the disk viscosity in those regions is low ($α\le 10^{-5}$). ALMA is instead unable to resolve these structures in these disk regions. We also show that high-resolution ngVLA observations separated by several days to few weeks would allow to detect the proper motion of the azimuthally asymmetric structures expected in the disk regions of terrestrial planet formation.

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arXiv2020

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): II. Characteristics of Annular Substructures

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project used ALMA to map the 1.25 millimeter continuum of protoplanetary disks at a spatial resolution of ~5 au. We present a systematic analysis of annular substructures in the 18 single-disk systems targeted in this survey. No dominant architecture emerges from this sample; instead, remarkably diverse morphologies are observed. Annular substructures can occur at virtually any radius where millimeter continuum emission is detected and range in widths from a few au to tens of au. Intensity ratios between gaps and adjacent rings range from near-unity to just a few percent. In a minority of cases, annular substructures co-exist with other types of substructures, including spiral arms (3/18) and crescent-like azimuthal asymmetries (2/18). No clear trend is observed between the positions of the substructures and stellar host properties. In particular, the absence of an obvious association with stellar host luminosity (and hence the disk thermal structure) suggests that substructures do not occur preferentially near major molecular snowlines. Annular substructures like those observed in DSHARP have long been hypothesized to be due to planet-disk interactions. A few disks exhibit characteristics particularly suggestive of this scenario, including substructures in possible mean-motion resonance and "double gap" features reminiscent of hydrodynamical simulations of multiple gaps opened by a planet in a low-viscosity disk.

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arXiv2020

The effects of disk self-gravity and radiative cooling on the formation of gaps and spirals by young planets

We have carried out two-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations to study the effects of disk self-gravity and radiative cooling on the formation of gaps and spirals. (1) With disk self-gravity included, we find stronger, more tightly-wound spirals and deeper gaps in more massive disks. The deeper gaps are due to the larger Angular Momentum Flux (AMF) of the waves excited in more massive disks, as expected from the linear theory. The position of the secondary gap does not change, provided that the disk is not extremely massive ($Q \gtrsim 2$). (2) With radiative cooling included, the excited spirals become monotonically more open (less tightly-wound) as the disk's cooling timescale increases. On the other hand, the amplitude and strength of the spirals decrease when the cooling time increases from a small value to $\sim 1/Ω$, but then the amplitude starts to increase again when the cooling time continues to increase. This indicates that radiative dissipation becomes important for waves with $T_{cool}\sim$ 1. Consequently, the induced primary gap is narrower and the secondary gap becomes significantly shallower when the cooling time becomes $\sim 1/Ω$. When the secondary gap is present, the position of it moves to the inner disk from the fast cooling cases to the slow cooling cases. The dependence of gap properties on the cooling timescale (e.g. in AS 209) provides a new way to constrain the disk optical depth and thus disk surface density.

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arXiv2020

A multi-frequency ALMA characterization of substructures in the GM Aur protoplanetary disk

The protoplanetary disk around the T Tauri star GM Aur was one of the first hypothesized to be in the midst of being cleared out by a forming planet. As a result, GM Aur has had an outsized influence on our understanding of disk structure and evolution. We present 1.1 and 2.1 mm ALMA continuum observations of the GM Aur disk at a resolution of ~50 mas (~8 au), as well as HCO$^+$ $J=3-2$ observations at a resolution of ~100 mas. The dust continuum shows at least three rings atop faint, extended emission. Unresolved emission is detected at the center of the disk cavity at both wavelengths, likely due to a combination of dust and free-free emission. Compared to the 1.1 mm image, the 2.1 mm image shows a more pronounced "shoulder" near R~40 au, highlighting the utility of longer-wavelength observations for characterizing disk substructures. The spectral index $α$ features strong radial variations, with minima near the emission peaks and maxima near the gaps. While low spectral indices have often been ascribed to grain growth and dust trapping, the optical depth of GM Aur's inner two emission rings renders their dust properties ambiguous. The gaps and outer disk ($R>100$ au) are optically thin at both wavelengths. Meanwhile, the HCO$^+$ emission indicates that the gas cavity is more compact than the dust cavity traced by the millimeter continuum, similar to other disks traditionally classified as "transitional."

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arXiv2019

One Solution to the Mass Budget Problem for Planet Formation: Optically Thick Disks with Dust Scattering

ALMA surveys have suggested that the dust in Class II disks may not be enough to explain the averaged solid mass in exoplanets, under the assumption that the mm disk continuum emission is optically thin. This optically thin assumption seems to be supported by recent DSHARP observations where the measured optical depths of spatially resolved disks are mostly less than one. However, we point out that dust scattering can considerably reduce the emission from an optically thick region. If that scattering is ignored, the optical depth will be considerably underestimated. An optically thick disk with scattering can be misidentified as an optically thin disk. Dust scattering in more inclined disks can reduce the intensity even further, making the disk look even fainter. The measured optical depth of $\sim$0.6 in several DSHARP disks can be naturally explained by optically thick dust with an albedo of $\sim$0.9 at 1.25 mm. Using the DSHARP opacity, this albedo corresponds to a dust population with the maximum grain size ($s_{max}$) of 0.1-1 mm. For optically thick scattering disks, the measured spectral index $α$ can be either larger or smaller than 2 depending on if the dust albedo increases or decreases with wavelength. Using the DSHARP opacity, $α<2$ corresponds to $s_{max}$ of 0.03-0.3 mm. We describe how this optically thick scattering scenario could explain the observed scaling between submm continuum sizes and luminosities, and might help ease the tension between the dust size constraints from polarization and dust continuum measurements. We suggest that a significant amount of disk mass can be hidden from ALMA observations at short millimeter wavelengths. For compact disks smaller than 30 au, we can easily underestimate the dust mass by more than a factor of 10. Longer wavelength observations (e.g. VLA or SKA) are desired to probe the dust mass in disks.

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arXiv2019

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): III. Spiral Structures in the Millimeter Continuum of the Elias 27, IM Lup, and WaOph 6 Disks

We present an analysis of ALMA 1.25 millimeter continuum observations of spiral structures in three protoplanetary disks from the Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project. The disks around Elias 27, IM Lup, and WaOph 6 were observed at a resolution of $\sim40-60$ mas ($\sim6-7$ au). All three disks feature $m=2$ spiral patterns in conjunction with annular substructures. Gas kinematics established by $^{12}$CO $J=2-1$ observations indicate that the continuum spiral arms are trailing. The arm-interarm intensity contrasts are modest, typically less than 3. The Elias 27 spiral pattern extends throughout much of the disk, and the arms intersect the gap at $R\sim69$ au. The spiral pattern in the IM Lup disk is particularly complex-it extends about halfway radially through the disk, exhibiting pitch angle variations with radius and interarm features that may be part of ring substructures or spiral arm branches. Spiral arms also extend most of the way through the WaOph 6 disk, but the source overall is much more compact than the other two disks. We discuss possible origins for the spiral structures, including gravitational instability and density waves induced by a stellar or planetary companion. Unlike the millimeter continuum counterparts of many of the disks with spiral arms detected in scattered light, these three sources do not feature high-contrast crescent-like asymmetries or large ($R>20$ au) emission cavities. This difference may point to multiple spiral formation mechanisms operating in disks.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): IV. Characterizing substructures and interactions in disks around multiple star systems

To characterize the substructures induced in protoplanetary disks by the interaction between stars in multiple systems, we study the $1.25\,$mm continuum and the $^{12}$CO$(J=2-1)$ spectral line emission of the triple systems HT Lup and AS 205, at scales of $\approx 5\,$au, as part of the 'Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project' (DSHARP). In the continuum emission, we find two symmetric spiral arms in the disk around AS 205 N, with pitch angle of $14^\circ$, while the southern component AS 205 S, itself a spectroscopic binary, is surrounded by a compact inner disk and a bright ring at a radius of $34\,$au. The $^{12}$CO line exhibits clear signatures of tidal interactions, with spiral arms, extended arc-like emission, and high velocity gas, possible evidence of a recent close encounter between the disks in the AS 205 system, as these features are predicted by hydrodynamic simulations of fly-by encounters. In the HT Lup system, we detect continuum emission from all three components. The primary disk, HT Lup A, also shows two-armed symmetric spiral structure with a pitch angle of $4^\circ$, while HT Lup B and C, located at $25$ and $434\,$au in projected separation from HT Lup A, are barely resolved with $\sim5$ and $\sim10\,$au in diameter, respectively. The gas kinematics for the closest pair indicates a different sense of rotation for each disk, which could be explained by either a counter rotation of the two disks in different, close to parallel, planes, or by a projection effect of these disks with a close to $90^\circ$ misalignment between them.

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arXiv2018

Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Program (DSHARP): VIII. The Rich Ringed Substructures in the AS 209 Disk

We present a detailed analysis of the high-angular resolution (0.''037, corresponding to 5 au) observations of the 1.25 mm continuum and $^{12}$CO $2-1$ emission from the disk around the T Tauri star AS 209. AS 209 hosts one of the most unusual disks from the DSHARP sample, the first high angular resolution ALMA survey of disks (Andrews et al. 2018), as nearly all of the emission can be explained with concentric Gaussian rings. In particular, the dust emission consists of a series of narrow and closely spaced rings in the inner $\sim$60 au, two well-separated bright rings in the outer disk, centered at 74 and 120 au, and at least two fainter emission features at 90 and 130 au. We model the visibilities with a parametric representation of the radial surface brightness profile, consisting of a central core and 7 concentric Gaussian rings. Recent hydro-dynamical simulations of low viscosity disks show that super-Earth planets can produce the multiple gaps seen in AS 209 millimeter continuum emission. The $^{12}$CO line emission is centrally peaked and extends out to $\sim$300 au, much farther than the millimeter dust emission. We find axisymmetric, localized deficits of CO emission around four distinct radii, near 45, 75, 120 and 210 au. The outermost gap is located well beyond the edge of the millimeter dust emission, and therefore cannot be due to dust opacity and must be caused by a genuine CO surface density reduction, due either to chemical effects or depletion of the overall gas content.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): I. Motivation, Sample, Calibration, and Overview

We introduce the Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP), one of the initial Large Programs conducted with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA). The primary goal of DSHARP is to find and characterize substructures in the spatial distributions of solid particles for a sample of 20 nearby protoplanetary disks, using very high resolution (0.035 arcsec, or 5 au FWHM) observations of their 240 GHz (1.25 mm) continuum emission. These data provide a first homogeneous look at the small-scale features in disks that are directly relevant to the planet formation process, quantifying their prevalence, morphologies, spatial scales, spacings, symmetry, and amplitudes, for targets with a variety of disk and stellar host properties. We find that these substructures are ubiquitous in this sample of large, bright disks. They are most frequently manifested as concentric, narrow emission rings and depleted gaps, although large-scale spiral patterns and small arc-shaped azimuthal asymmetries are also present in some cases. These substructures are found at a wide range of disk radii (from a few au to more than 100 au), are usually compact ($<$10 au), and show a wide range of amplitudes (brightness contrasts). Here we discuss the motivation for the project, describe the survey design and the sample properties, detail the observations and data calibration, highlight some basic results, and provide a general overview of the key conclusions that are presented in more detail in a series of accompanying articles. The DSHARP data -- including visibilities, images, calibration scripts, and more -- are released for community use at https://almascience.org/alma-data/lp/DSHARP.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) VI: Dust trapping in thin-ringed protoplanetary disks

A large fraction of the protoplanetary disks observed with ALMA display multiple well-defined and nearly perfectly circular rings in the continuum, in many cases with substantial peak-to-valley contrast. The DSHARP campaign shows that several of these rings are very narrow in radial extent. In this paper we test the hypothesis that these dust rings are caused by dust trapping in radial pressure bumps, and if confirmed, put constraints on the physics of the dust trapping mechanism. We model this process analytically in 1D, assuming axisymmetry. By comparing this model to the data, we find that all rings are consistent with dust trapping. Based on a plausible model of the dust temperature we find that several rings are narrower than the pressure scale height, providing strong evidence for dust trapping. The rings have peak absorption optical depth in the range between 0.2 and 0.5. The dust masses stored in each of these rings is of the order of tens of Earth masses, though much ambiguity remains due to the uncertainty of the dust opacities. The dust rings are dense enough to potentially trigger the streaming instability, but our analysis cannot give proof of this mechanism actually operating. Our results show, however, that the combination of very low alpha_turb << 5e-4 and very large grains a_grain >> 0.1 cm can be excluded by the data for all the rings studied in this paper.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): V. Interpreting ALMA maps of protoplanetary disks in terms of a dust model

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) is the largest homogeneous high-resolution ($\sim 0.035$ arcsec, or $\sim$ 5 au) disk continuum imaging survey with ALMA so far. In the coming years, many more disks will be mapped with ALMA at similar resolution. Interpreting the results in terms of the properties and quantities of the emitting dusty material is, however, a very non-trivial task. This is in part due to the uncertainty in the dust opacities, an uncertainty which is not likely to be resolved any time soon. It is also partly due to the fact that, as the DSHARP survey has shown, these disk often contain regions of intermediate to high optical depth, even at millimeter wavelengths and at relatively large radius in the disk. This makes the interpretation challenging, in particular if the grains are large and have a large albedo. On the other hand, the highly structured features seen in the DSHARP survey, of which strong indications were already seen in earlier observations, provide a unique opportunity to study the dust growth and dynamics. To provide continuity within the DSHARP project, its follow-up projects, and projects by other teams interested in these data, we present here the methods and opacity choices used within the DSHARP collaboration to link the measured intensity $I_ν$ to dust surface density $Σ_d$.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): VII. The Planet-Disk Interactions Interpretation

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) provides a large sample of protoplanetary disks having substructures which could be induced by young forming planets. To explore the properties of planets that may be responsible for these substructures, we systematically carry out a grid of 2-D hydrodynamical simulations including both gas and dust components. We present the resulting gas structures, including the relationship between the planet mass and 1) the gaseous gap depth/width, and 2) the sub/super-Keplerian motion across the gap. We then compute dust continuum intensity maps at the frequency of the DSHARP observations. We provide the relationship between the planet mass and 1) the depth/width of the gaps at millimeter intensity maps, 2) the gap edge ellipticity and asymmetry, and 3) the position of secondary gaps induced by the planet. With these relationships, we lay out the procedure to constrain the planet mass using gap properties, and study the potential planets in the DSHARP disks. We highlight the excellent agreement between observations and simulations for AS 209 and the detectability of the young Solar System analog. Finally, under the assumption that the detected gaps are induced by young planets, we characterize the young planet population in the planet mass-semimajor axis diagram. We find that the occurrence rate for $>$ 5 $M_J$ planets beyond 5-10 au is consistent with direct imaging constraints. Disk substructures allow us probe a wide-orbit planet population (Neptune to Jupiter mass planets beyond 10 au) that is not accessible to other planet searching techniques.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): X. Multiple rings, a misaligned inner disk, and a bright arc in the disk around the T Tauri star HD 143006

We present a detailed analysis of new ALMA observations of the disk around the T-Tauri star HD 143006, which at 46 mas (7.6 au) resolution reveal new substructures in the 1.25 mm continuum emission. The disk resolves into a series of concentric rings and gaps together with a bright arc exterior to the rings that resembles hydrodynamics simulations of a vortex, and a bridge-like feature connecting the two innermost rings. Although our $^{12}$CO observations at similar spatial resolution do not show obvious substructure, they reveal an inner disk depleted of CO emission. From the continuum emission and the CO velocity field we find that the innermost ring has a higher inclination than the outermost rings and the arc. This is evidence for either a small ($\sim8^{\circ}$) or moderate ($\sim41^{\circ}$) misalignment between the inner and outer disk, depending on the specific orientation of the near/far sides of the inner/outer disk. We compare the observed substructures in the ALMA observations with recent scattered light data from VLT/SPHERE of this object. In particular, the location of narrow shadow lanes in the SPHERE image combined with pressure scale height estimates, favor a large misalignment of about $41^{\circ}$. We discuss our findings in the context of a dust-trapping vortex, planet-carved gaps, and a misaligned inner disk due to the presence of an inclined companion to HD 143006.

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arXiv2018

The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) - IX. A high definition study of the HD 163296 planet forming disk

ALMA observations of protoplanetary disks acquired by the Disk Substructure at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) resolve the dust and gas emission on angular scales as small as 3 astronomical units, offering an unprecedented detailed view of the environment where planets form. In this article, we present and discuss observations of the HD 163296 protoplanetary disk that imaged the 1.25 mm dust continuum and $^{12}$CO J=2-1 rotational line emission at a spatial resolution of 4 and 10 au, respectively. The continuum observations resolve and allow us to characterize the previously discovered dust rings at radii of 67 and 100 au. They also reveal new small scale structures, such as a dark gap at 10 au, a bright ring at 15 au, a dust crescent at a radius of 55 au, and several fainter azimuthal asymmetries. The observations of the CO and dust emission inform about the vertical structure of the disk and allow us to directly constrain the dust extinction optical depth at the dust rings. Furthermore, the observed asymmetries in the dust continuum emission corroborate to the hypothesis that the complex structure of the HD 163296 disk is the result of the gravitational interaction with yet unseen planets.

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arXiv2018

On estimating angular momenta of infalling protostellar cores from observations

We use numerical simulations of molecular cloud formation in the colliding flow scenario to investigate the reliability of observational estimates of the angular momenta of early-state, low-mass protostellar cores. We show that, with suitable corrections for projection factors, molecular line observations of velocity gradients in NH$_3$ can be used to provide reasonable estimates of core angular momenta within a factor of two to three, with a few large underestimates due to unfavorable viewing angles. Our results differ from previous investigations which suggested that observations might overestimate true angular momenta by as much as an order of magnitude; the difference is probably due to the much smoother velocity field on small scales in our simulations, which result from allowing turbulence to decay and gravitational infall to dominate. The results emphasize the importance of understanding the nature of 'turbulent' velocities, with implications for the formation of protostellar disks during core collapse.

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arXiv2017

The Circum-Galactic Medium of MASsive Spirals II: Probing the Nature of Hot Gaseous Halo around the Most Massive Isolated Spiral Galaxies

We present the analysis of the XMM-Newton data of the Circum-Galactic Medium of MASsive Spirals (CGM-MASS) sample of six extremely massive spiral galaxies in the local Universe. All the CGM-MASS galaxies have diffuse X-ray emission from hot gas detected above the background extending $\sim(30-100)\rm~kpc$ from the galactic center. This doubles the existing detection of such extended hot CGM around massive spiral galaxies. The radial soft X-ray intensity profile of hot gas can be fitted with a $β$-function with the slope typically in the range of $β=0.35-0.55$. This range, as well as those $β$ values measured for other massive spiral galaxies, including the Milky Way (MW), are in general consistent with X-ray luminous elliptical galaxies of similar hot gas luminosity and temperature, and with those predicted from a hydrostatic isothermal gaseous halo. Hot gas in such massive spiral galaxy tends to have temperature comparable to its virial value, indicating the importance of gravitational heating. This is in contrast to lower mass galaxies where hot gas temperature tends to be systematically higher than the virial one. The ratio of the radiative cooling to free fall timescales of hot gas is much larger than the critical value of $\sim10$ throughout the entire halos of all the CGM-MASS galaxies, indicating the inefficiency of gas cooling and precipitation in the CGM. The hot CGM in these massive spiral galaxies is thus most likely in a hydrostatic state, with the feedback material mixed with the CGM, instead of escaping out of the halo or falling back to the disk. We also homogenize and compare the halo X-ray luminosity measured for the CGM-MASS galaxies and other galaxy samples and discuss the "missing" galactic feedback detected in these massive spiral galaxies.

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