ACCRETION DISKS AROUND CLASS-O PROTOSTARS - THE CASE OF VLA-1623

Continuum emission at 220 and 355 GHz from the prototype class 0 sourc e VLA 1623 has been detected using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope-C altech Submillimeter Observatory interferometer. Gaussian fits to the data place an upper limit of 70 AU on the half-width at half-maximum r adius of the emission, which implies an upper limit of similar to 175 AU for the cutoff radius of the circumstellar disk in the system. In t he context of existing collapse models, this disk could be magneticall y supported on the largest scales and have an age of similar to 6 x 10 (4) yr, consistent with previous suggestions that class 0 sources are quite young. The innermost region of the disk within similar to 6 AU i s likely to be in centrifugal support, which is likely large enough to provide a drive for the outflow according to current theoretical mode ls. Alternatively, if 175 AU corresponds to the centrifugal radius of the disk, the age of the system is similar to 2 x 10(5) yr, closer to age estimates for class I sources.