Promoted mass growth of multiple, distant giant planets through pebble accretion and planet–planet collision

• Published in: Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Vol. 496; no. 3; pp. 3314 - 3325
• Main Authors: Wimarsson, John, Liu, Beibei, Ogihara, Masahiro
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford University Press 11-08-2020
• Subjects: methods: numerical; planets and satellites: formation
• ISSN: 0035-8711; 1365-2966
• DOI: 10.1093/mnras/staa1708

ABSTRACT
We propose a pebble-driven planet formation scenario to form giant planets with high multiplicity and large orbital distances in the early gas disc phase. We perform N-body simulations to investigate the growth and migration of low-mass protoplanets in the disc with inner viscously heated and outer stellar irradiated regions. The key feature of this model is that the giant planet cores grow rapidly by a combination of pebble accretion and planet–planet collisions. This consequently speeds up their gas accretion. Because of efficient growth, the planet transitions from rapid type I migration to slow type II migration early, reducing the inward migration substantially. Multiple giant planets can sequentially form in this way with increasing semimajor axes. Both mass growth and orbital retention are more pronounced when a large number of protoplanets are taken into account compared to the case of single planet growth. Eventually, a few numbers of giant planets form with orbital distances of a few to a few tens of aus within 1.5–3 Myr after the birth of the protoplanets. The resulting simulated planet populations could be linked to the substructures exhibited in disc observations as well as large orbital distance exoplanets observed in radial velocity and microlensing surveys.