Characterizing Extra-solar Oort Clouds with Submillimeter-wave Observations

Abstract

The Oort cloud, a collection of icy bodies orbiting the sun at roughly $10^{3}$ AU to $10^{5}$ AU, is believed to be the source of the long-period comets observed in the inner solar system. Although its existence was predicted nearly 70 years ago, no direct detection of the Oort cloud has been made to date. Given our current understanding of the formation of the Oort cloud, it is likely that many stars beyond the sun host their own exo-Oort clouds. We have recently pointed out that submillimeter-wave telescopes have the capability to detect the thermal emission from these clouds. High resolution observations of nearby stars with next generation submillimeter telescopes can obtain high significance detections of exo-Oort clouds, even in fairly conservative emission models. A detection and characterization of such emission would open a new window into the study of the properties and evolution of planetary systems.