We validate a R R 2.32 0.24 p =  Å planet on a close-in orbit (P=2.260455±0.000041 days) around K2-28 (EPIC206318379), a metal-rich M4-type dwarf in the Campaign 3 field of the K2 mission. Our follow-up observations included multi-band transit observations from the optical to the near-infrared, low-resolution spectroscopy, and high-resolution adaptive optics (AO) imaging. We perform a global fit to all of the observed transits using a Gaussian process-based method and show that the transit depths in all of the passbands adopted for the ground-based transit follow-ups (r z J H K , , , ,¢ ) are within ∼2σ of the K2 value. Based on a model of the background stellar population and the absence of nearby sources in our AO imaging, we estimate the probability that a background eclipsing binary could cause a false positive to be <2×10 −5 . We also show that K2-28 cannot have a physically associated companion of stellar type later than M4, based on the measurement of almost identical transit depths in multiple passbands. There is a low probability for an M4 dwarf companion ( 0.072 0.04 0.02 » -+), but even if this were the case, the size of K2-28b falls within the planetary regime. K2-28b has the same radius (within 1σ) and experiences irradiation from its host star similar to the well-studied GJ1214b. Given the relative brightness of K2-28 in the near-infrared (m 14.85 Kep = mag and m H =11.03 mag) and relatively deep transit (0.6%-0.7%), a comparison between the atmospheric properties of these two planets with future observations would be especially interesting.

Comets are thought to have information about the formation process of our solar system. Recently, detailed information about comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko has been found by a spacecraft mission Rosetta. It is remarkable that its tensile strength was estimated. In this paper, we measure and formulate the tensile strength of porous dust aggregates using numerical simulations, motivated by porous dust aggregation model of planetesimal formation. We perform three-dimensional numerical simulations using a monomer interaction model with periodic boundary condition. We stretch out a dust aggregate with a various initial volume filling factor between 10 −2 and 0.5. We find that the tensile stress takes the maximum value at the time when the volume filling factor decreases to about a half of the initial value. The maximum stress is defined to be the tensile strength. We take an average of the results with 10 different initial shapes to smooth out the effects of initial shapes of aggregates. Finally, we numerically obtain the relation between the tensile strength and the initial volume filling factor of dust aggregates. We also use a simple semi-analytical model and successfully reproduce the numerical results, which enables us to apply to a wide parameter range and different materials. The obtained relation is consistent with previous experiments and numerical simulations about silicate dust aggregates. We estimate that the monomer radius of comet 67P has to be about 3.3-220 µm to reproduce its tensile strength using our model.

We introduce a possible disruption mechanism of dust grains in planet formation by their spinning motion. This mechanism has been discussed as rotational disruption for the interstellar dust grains. We theoretically calculate whether porous dust aggregates can be disrupted by their spinning motion and whether it prohibits dust growth in protoplanetary disks. We assume radiative torque and gas-flow torque as driving sources of the spinning motion, assume that dust aggregates reach a steady-state rigid rotation, and compare the obtained tensile stress due to the centrifugal force with their tensile strength. We model the irregularly shaped dust aggregates by introducing a parameter, γ ft, that mimics the conversion efficiency from force to torque. As a result, we find that porous dust aggregates are rotationally disrupted by their spinning motion induced by gas flow when their mass is larger than ∼108 g and their volume filling factor is smaller than ∼0.01 in our fiducial model, while relatively compact dust aggregates with volume filling factor more than 0.01 do not face this problem. If we assume the dust porosity evolution, we find that dust aggregates whose Stokes number is ∼0.1 can be rotationally disrupted in their growth and compression process. Our results suggest that the growth of dust aggregates may be halted due to rotational disruption or that other compression mechanisms are needed to avoid it. We also note that dust aggregates are not rotationally disrupted when γ ft ≤ 0.02 in our fiducial model and the modeling of irregularly shaped dust aggregates is essential in future work.