Dust Continuum Observations of Protostars: Constraining Properties with Simulations

Abstract

The properties of unresolved protostars and their local environment (e.g., disk, envelope and outflow characteristics) are frequently inferred from spectral energy distributions (SEDs) through comparison with idealized model SEDs. However, if it is not possible to image a source and its environment directly, it is difficult to constrain and evaluate the accuracy of these derived properties. In this proceeding, I present a brief overview of the reliability of SED modeling by analyzing dust continuum synthetic observations of realistic simulations.