Related papers: Radiative Thrusters on Close-in Extrasolar Planets
The modestly eccentric and non-coplanar orbits of the giant planets pose a challenge to solar system formation theories which generally indicate that the giant planets emerged from the protoplanetary disk in nearly perfectly circular and…
Transiting exoplanets provide access to data to study the mass-radius relation and internal structure of extrasolar planets. Long-period transiting planets allow insight into planetary environments similar to the Solar System where, in…
The increasing number of super-Earths close to their host stars revealed a scarcity of close-in small planets with 1.5-2.0$\,R_\oplus$ in the radius distribution of ${\it Kepler}$ planets. The atmospheric escape of super-Earths by…
Planets around binary stars and those in multiplanet systems may experience resonant eccentricity excitation and disruption due to perturbations from a distant stellar companion. This "evection resonance" occurs when the apsidal precession…
Kepler's observation shows that many of the detected planets are super-Earths. They are inside a range of critical masses overlapping the core masses (2-20 $M_{\bigoplus}$), which would trigger the runaway accretion and develop the gas…
Nine extrasolar planets with masses between 110 and 430M are known to transit their star. The knowledge of their masses and radii allows an estimate of their composition, but uncertainties on equations of state, opacities and possible…
Planetesimal accretion during planet formation is usually treated as collisionless. Such accretion from a uniform and dynamically cold disk predicts protoplanets with slow retrograde rotation. However, if the building blocks of…
A transiting planet eclipses part of the rotating stellar surface, thereby producing an anomalous Doppler shift of the stellar spectrum. Here I review how this "Rossiter-McLaughlin Effect" can be used to characterize exoplanetary systems.…
Close-in extrasolar planets experience extreme tidal interactions with their host stars. This may lead to a reduction of the planetary orbit and a spin-up of stellar rotation. Tidal interactions have been computed for a number of extrasolar…
We generalize the problem of the semi-gray model to cases in which a non-negligible fraction of the stellar radiation falls on the long-wavelength range, and/or that the planetary long-wavelength emission penetrates into the transparent…
Many features of the outer solar system are replicated in numerical simulations if the giant planets undergo an orbital instability that ejects one or more ice giants. During this instability, Jupiter and Saturn's orbits diverge, crossing…
Terrestrial planets form in a series of dynamical steps from the solid component of circumstellar disks. First, km-sized planetesimals form likely via a combination of sticky collisions, turbulent concentration of solids, and gravitational…
In transiting planetary systems, the angle between the orbital angular momentum and the stellar spin is usually constrained through the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect observed in radial velocity and can be subject to large uncertainties,…
When extrasolar planets are observed to transit their parent stars, we are granted unprecedented access to their physical properties. It is only for transiting planets that we are permitted direct estimates of the planetary masses and…
The observed orbits of extrasolar planets suggest that many giant planets migrate a considerable distance towards their parent star as a result of interactions with the protoplanetary disk, and that some of these planets become trapped in…
X-rays and extreme ultraviolet radiation impacting on a gas produce a variety of effects that, depending on the electron content, may provide a significant heating of the illuminated region. In a planetary atmosphere of solar composition,…
Multi-planet systems face significant challenges to detection. For example, further orbiting planets have reduced signal-to-noise ratio in radial velocity detection methods, and small mutual inclinations between planets can prevent them…
While planets in the solar system only have a low inclination with respect to the ecliptic there is mounting evidence that in extrasolar systems the inclination can be very high, at least for close-in planets. One process to alter the…
The late phases of the orbital evolution of an Earth-like planet around a Sun-like star are revisited considering the effect of the density fluctuations associated with convective motions inside the star. Such fluctuations produce a random…
Small planets, 1-4x the size of Earth, are extremely common around Sun-like stars, and surprisingly so, as they are missing in our solar system. Recent detections have yielded enough information about this class of exoplanets to begin…