SONS: The JCMT legacy survey of debris discs in the submillimetre
  Debris discs are evidence of the ongoing destructive collisions between
planetesimals, and their presence around stars also suggests that planets exist
in these systems. In this paper, we present submillimetre images of the thermal
emission from debris discs that formed the SCUBA-2 Observations of Nearby Stars
(SONS) survey, one of seven legacy surveys undertaken on the James Clerk
Maxwell telescope between 2012 and 2015. The overall results of the survey are
presented in the form of 850 microns (and 450 microns, where possible) images
and fluxes for the observed fields. Excess thermal emission, over that expected
from the stellar photosphere, is detected around 49 stars out of the 100
observed fields. The discs are characterised in terms of their flux density,
size (radial distribution of the dust) and derived dust properties from their
spectral energy distributions. The results show discs over a range of sizes,
typically 1-10 times the diameter of the Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt in our Solar
System. The mass of a disc, for particles up to a few millimetres in size, is
uniquely obtainable with submillimetre observations and this quantity is
presented as a function of the host stars' age, showing a tentative decline in
mass with age. Having doubled the number of imaged discs at submillimetre
wavelengths from ground-based, single dish telescope observations, one of the
key legacy products from the SONS survey is to provide a comprehensive target
list to observe at high angular resolution using submillimetre/millimetre
interferometers (e.g., ALMA, SMA).
