Water and simple organic molecular ices dominate the mass of solid materials available for planetesimal and planet formation beyond the water snow line. Here we analyze ALMA long baseline 2.9, 1.3 and 0.87 mm continuum images of the young star HL Tau, and suggest that the emission dips observed are due to rapid pebble growth around the condensation fronts of abundant volatile species. Specifically, we show that the prominent innermost dip at 13 AU is spatially resolved in the 0.87 mm image, and its center radius is coincident with the expected mid-plane condensation front of water ice. In addition, two other prominent dips, at distances of 32 and 63 AU, cover the mid-plane condensation fronts of pure ammonia or ammonia hydrates and clathrate hydrates (especially with CO and N 2 ) formed from amorphous water ice. The spectral index map of HL Tau between 1.3 and 0.87 mm shows that the flux ratios inside the dips are statistically larger than those of nearby regions in the disk. This variation can be explained by a model with two dust populations, where most of solid mass resides in a component that has grown into decimeter size scales inside the dips. Such growth is in accord with recent numerical simulations of volatile condensation, dust coagulation and settling.

We present the first kinematical detection of embedded protoplanets within a protoplanetary disk. Using archival ALMA observations of HD 163296, we demonstrate a new technique to measure the rotation curves of CO isotopologue emission to sub-percent precision relative to the Keplerian rotation. These rotation curves betray substantial deviations caused by local perturbations in the radial pressure gradient, likely driven by gaps carved in the gas surface density by Jupiter-mass planets. Comparison with hydrodynamic simulations shows excellent agreement with the gas rotation profile when the disk surface density is perturbed by two Jupiter mass planets at 83 au and 137 au. As the rotation of the gas is dependent on the pressure of the total gas component, this method provides a unique probe of the gas surface density profile without incurring significant uncertainties due to gas-to-dust ratios or local chemical abundances which plague other methods. Future analyses combining both methods promise to provide the most accurate and robust measures of embedded planetary mass. Furthermore, this method provides a unique opportunity to explore wide-separation planets beyond the mm continuum edge and to trace the gas pressure profile essential in modelling grain evolution in disks.

We report observations of resolved C 2 H emission rings within the gas-rich protoplanetary disks of TWHya and DMTau using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. In each case the emission ring is found to arise at the edge of the observable disk of millimeter-sized grains (pebbles) traced by submillimeter-wave continuum emission. In addition, we detect a C 3 H 2 emission ring with an identical spatial distribution to C 2 H in the TWHya disk. This suggests that these are hydrocarbon rings (i.e., not limited to C 2 H). Using a detailed thermo-chemical model we show that reproducing the emission from C 2 H requires a strong UV field and C/O>1 in the upper disk atmosphere and outer disk, beyond the edge of the pebble disk. This naturally arises in a disk where the ice-coated dust mass is spatially stratified due to the combined effects of coagulation, gravitational settling and drift. This stratification causes the disk surface and outer disk to have a greater permeability to UV photons. Furthermore the concentration of ices that transport key volatile carriers of oxygen and carbon in the midplane, along with photochemical erosion of CO, leads to an elemental C/O ratio that exceeds unity in the UV-dominated disk. Thus the motions of the grains, and not the gas, lead to a rich hydrocarbon chemistry in disk surface layers and in the outer disk midplane.

We present the first ~7.5'×11.5' velocity-resolved (~0.2 km s) map of the [C ii] 158 m line toward the Orion molecular cloud 1 (OMC 1) taken with the/HIFI instrument. In combination with far-infrared (FIR) photometric images and velocity-resolved maps of the H41 hydrogen recombination and CO =2-1 lines, this data set provides an unprecedented view of the intricate small-scale kinematics of the ionized/PDR/molecular gas interfaces and of the radiative feedback from massive stars. The main contribution to the [C ii] luminosity (~85 %) is from the extended, FUV-illuminated face of the cloud (>500, >5×10 cm) and from dense PDRs (≳10, ≳10 cm) at the interface between OMC 1 and the H ii region surrounding the Trapezium cluster. Around ~15 % of the [C ii] emission arises from a different gas component without CO counterpart. The [C ii] excitation, PDR gas turbulence, line opacity (from [C ii]) and role of the geometry of the illuminating stars with respect to the cloud are investigated. We construct maps of the [C ii]/ and / ratios and show that [C ii]/ decreases from the extended cloud component (~10-10) to the more opaque star-forming cores (~10-10). The lowest values are reminiscent of the "[C ii] deficit" seen in local ultra-luminous IR galaxies hosting vigorous star formation. Spatial correlation analysis shows that the decreasing [C ii]/ ratio correlates better with the column density of dust through the molecular cloud than with /. We conclude that the [C ii] emitting column relative to the total dust column along each line of sight is responsible for the observed [C ii]/ variations through the cloud.