2025ApJ...984L..57O

Understanding the origin of substructures in protoplanetary disks and their connection to planet formation is currently one of the main challenges in astrophysics. While some disks appear smooth, most exhibit diverse substructures such as gaps, rings, or inner cavities, with varying brightness and depth. As part of the Ophiuchus DIsk Survey Employing ALMA, we previously proposed an evolutionary sequence to unify this diversity, driven by the formation of giant planets through core accretion and subsequent planet-disk interactions. By combining the disk evolution and planet formation code PLANETALP with the radiative transfer code RADMC-3D, we have now reproduced the key aspects of the proposed evolutionary sequence. Starting with a smooth disk (like, e.g., WLY 2-63), we modeled the evolution of a fiducial disk with a 1 M_Jup planet at 57 au. Within a few hundred orbits, a narrow gap forms, resembling ISO-Oph 17. By ∼0.1 Myr, the gap widens, and dust accumulates at the cavity edge, producing a structure similar to Elias 2-24. At ∼0.4 Myr, the disk evolves further into a morphology akin to DoAr 44, characterized by a smaller inner disk and a brighter inner rim. By ∼1 Myr, the system transitions to a single narrow ring resembling RXJ1633.9-2442. This line of work strongly supports the planetary origin of substructures and enables the possibility of identifying a population of planets that is currently beyond the reach of more direct detection techniques.