Sustained Kozai-Lidov oscillations in misaligned circumstellar gas disks

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that sustained Kozai-Lidov oscillations can occur in misaligned circumstellar disks due to continuous infall, leading to shocks and eccentricity growth that influence planet formation conditions.

Contribution

It reveals that ongoing infall of inclined material enables persistent KL oscillations in circumstellar disks, contrary to previous damping effects.

Findings

Continuous infall sustains KL oscillations in circumstellar disks.

KL oscillations induce shocks and eccentricity growth.

These effects impact planet formation environments.

Abstract

A disk around one component of a binary star system with sufficiently high inclination can undergo Kozai-Lidov (KL) oscillations during which the disk inclination and disk eccentricity are exchanged. Previous studies show that without a source of accretion, KL unstable disks exhibit damped oscillations, due to viscous dissipation, that leave the disk stable near or below the critical inclination for KL oscillations. With three-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations we show that a highly misaligned circumbinary disk that flows onto the binary components forms highly inclined circumstellar disks around each component. We show that a continuous infall of highly inclined material allows the KL oscillations to continue. The KL disk oscillations produce shocks and eccentricity growth in the circumstellar disks that affect the conditions for planet formation.