Formation of Giant Planets by Concurrent Accretion of Solids and Gas inside an Anticyclonic Vortex

Abstract

We study the formation of a giant gas planet by the core accretion and gas capture process, with numerical simulations, under the assumption that the planetary core forms in the center of an anticyclonic vortex. The presence of the vortex concentrates centimeter- to meter-sized particles from the surrounding disk and speeds up the core formation process. Assuming that a planet of Jupiter mass is forming at 5 AU from the star, the vortex enhancement results in considerably shorter formation times than are found in standard core-accretion gas-capture simulations. Also, formation of a gas giant is possible in a disk with mass comparable to that of the minimum mass solar nebula.