Growing into and out of the bouncing barrier in planetesimal formation

Fakultät für Physik, Universität Duisburg-Essen, Lotharstr. 1, 47057 Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: maximilian.kruss@uni-due.de

Received: 14 December 2016
Accepted: 15 February 2017

Abstract

In recent laboratory studies the robustness of a bouncing barrier in planetesimal formation was studied with an ensemble of pre-formed compact mm-sized aggregates. Here we show that a bouncing barrier indeed evolves self-consistently by hit-and-stick from an ensemble of smaller dust aggregates. In addition, we feed small aggregates to an ensemble of larger bouncing aggregates. The stickiness temporarily increases, but the final number of aggregates still bouncing remains the same. However, feeding on the small particle supply, the size of the bouncing aggregates increases. This suggests that in the presence of a dust reservoir aggregates grow into but also out of a bouncing barrier at larger size.