Related papers: Inevitability of Plate Tectonics on Super-Earths
In protoplanetary disks, sufficiently massive planets excite pressure bumps, which can then be preferred locations for forming new planet cores. We discuss how this loop may affect the architecture of multi-planet systems, and compare our…
Pressure is a key parameter in the physics and chemistry of planet formation and evolution. Previous studies have erroneously assumed that internal pressures monotonically increase with the mass of a body. Using smoothed particle…
We have developed a model for the Earth rotation that gives a good account (data) of the Earth astronomical parameters. These data can be compared with the ones obtained using space-base telescopes. The expansion of the universe has an…
Before about 500 million years ago, most probably our planet experienced temporary snowball conditions, with continental and sea ices covering a large fraction of its surface. This points to a potential bistability of Earth's climate, that…
Earth has a unique surface character among Solar System worlds. Not only does it harbor liquid water, but also large continents. An exoplanet with a similar appearance would remind us of home, but it is not obvious whether such a planet is…
Soft or Deformable Plate Tectonics in the sphere must follow geometric rules inferred from the orthographic projection. An analytic equivalent of this geometry can be derived by the application of Potential Field Methods in the case of…
The ejection of planets by the instability of planetary systems is a potential source of free-floating planets. We numerically simulate multi-planet systems to study the evolution process, the properties of surviving systems, and the…
Circumstantial evidence suggests that most known extra-solar planetary systems are survivors of violent dynamical instabilities. Here we explore how giant planet instabilities affect the formation and survival of terrestrial planets. We…
Surface liquid water is essential for standard planetary habitability. Calculations of atmospheric circulation on tidally locked planets around M stars suggest that this peculiar orbital configuration lends itself to the trapping of large…
Super-Earths are highly irradiated, small planets with bulk densities approximately consistent with Earth. We construct combined interior-atmosphere models of super-Earths that trace the partitioning of water throughout a planet, including…
Planet Earth has evolved from an entirely anoxic planet with possibly a different tectonic regime to the oxygenated world with horizontal plate tectonics that we know today. For most of this time, Earth has been inhabited by a purely…
In the last 15 years, since the discovery of the first low-mass planets beyond the solar system, there has been tremendous progress in understanding the diversity of (super-)Earth and sub-Neptune exoplanets. Especially the influence of the…
The presence of low viscosity layers in the mantle is supported by line of geological and geophysical observations. Recent high pressure and temperature investigations indicated that partial carbonate melt should exist at the bottom of the…
We used a thermal model of an iron core to calculate magnetodynamo evolution in Earth-mass rocky planets to determine the sensitivity of dynamo lifetime and intensity to planets with different mantle tectonic regimes, surface temperatures,…
Placing the architecture of the Solar System within the broader context of planetary architectures is one of the primary topics of interest within planetary science. Exoplanet discoveries have revealed a large range of system architectures,…
Many Sun-like stars are observed to host close-in super-Earths (SEs) as part of a multi-planetary system. In such a system, the spin of the SE evolves due to spin-orbit resonances and tidal dissipation. In the absence of tides, the planet's…
Relative to calcium, both strontium and barium are markedly enriched in Earth's continental crust compared to the basaltic crusts of other differentiated rocky bodies within the solar system. Here, we both re-examine available archived Keck…
Earth-like planets in the habitable zone of low-mass stars undergo strong tidal effects that modify their spin states. These planets are expected to host dense atmospheres that can also play an important role in the spin evolution. On one…
Earth-scale planets in the classical habitable zone (HZ) are more likely to be habitable if they possess active geophysics. Without a constant internal energy source, planets cool as they age, eventually terminating tectonic activity and…
Understanding the concept of habitability is related to an evolutionary knowledge of the particular planet-in-question. Additional indications so-called "systemic aspects" of the planetary system as a whole governs a particular planet's…