Related papers: On the Dynamical Stability of the Solar System
The dynamical evolution of the solar system is chaotic with a Lyapunov time of only $\sim$5 Myr for the inner planets. Due to the chaos it is fundamentally impossible to accurately predict the solar system's orbital evolution beyond…
Many of the multi-planet systems discovered to date have been notable for their compactness, with neighbouring planets closer together than any in the Solar System. Interestingly, planet-hosting stars have a wide range of ages, suggesting…
The mass and period ratios of the two planets orbiting 47 UMa suggest a possible kinship to the Jupiter-Saturn pair in our solar system. We explore the current dynamical state of the 47 UMa system with numerical integrations, and compare…
HR 8799 is a star accompanied by four massive planets on wide orbits. The observed planetary configuration has been shown to be unstable on a timescale much shorter than the estimated age of the system (~ 30 Myr) unless the planets are…
Numerical integrations of the Solar System have been carried out for decades. Their results have been used, for example, to determine whether the Solar System is chaotic, whether Mercury's orbit is stable, or to help discern Earth's climate…
This paper explores the stability of an Earth-like planet orbiting a solar-mass star in the presence of a stellar companion using ~ 400,000 numerical integrations. Given the chaotic nature of the systems being considered, we perform a…
We perform numerical simulations to study the secular orbital evolution and dynamical structure in the HD 69830 system with the best-fit orbital solutions by Lovis and coworkers (2006). In the simulations, we show that the triplet Neptunian…
A new era of directly imaged extrasolar planets has produced a three-planet system (Marois et al. 2008), where the masses of the planets have been estimated by untested cooling models. We point out that the nominal circular, face-on orbits…
An instability among the giant planets' orbits can match many aspects of the Solar System's current orbital architecture. We explore the possibility that this dynamical instability was triggered by the close passage of a star or substellar…
We study how close passages of interstellar objects of planetary and substellar masses may affect the immediate and long-term dynamics of the Solar system. We consider two nominal approach orbits, namely, the orbits of actual interstellar…
With the availability of considerably more data, we revisit the question of how special our Solar System is, compared to observed exoplanetary systems. To this goal, we employ a mathematical transformation that allows for a meaningful,…
We have studied planetary systems which are similar to the Solar System and built up from three inner rocky planets (Venus, Earth, Mars) and two outer gas giants. The stability of the orbits of the inner planets is discussed in the cases of…
Most stars form in star clusters and stellar associated. To understand the roles of star cluster environments in shaping the dynamical evolution of planetary systems, we carry out direct $N$-body simulations of four planetary systems models…
An episode of dynamical instability is thought to have sculpted the orbital structure of the outer solar system. When modeling this instability, a key constraint comes from Jupiter's fifth eccentric mode (quantified by its amplitude M55),…
The three-planet extrasolar system of HD 181433 has been detected with HARPS. The best-fit solution, announced by the discovery team, describes a highly unstable, self-disrupting configuration. In fact, a narrow observational window, only…
Solar quasi-biennial oscillations with period range 0.6 to 4 years, are prominent in records of solar activity. Here we show that the 1.6 year quasi-biennial oscillation in solar activity has the exceptional feature of phase inversion…
The planets' gravitational interaction causes rhythmic changes in Earth's orbital parameters (also called Milankovi\'c cycles), which have powerful applications in geology and astrochronology. For instance, the primary astronomical…
We show that interaction with a gas disk may produce young planetary systems with closely-spaced orbits, stabilized by mean-motion resonances between neighbors. On longer timescales, after the gas is gone, interaction with a remnant…
The potential existence of a distant planet ("Planet Nine") in the Solar system has prompted a re-think about the evolution of planetary systems. As the Sun transitions from a main sequence star into a white dwarf, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus…
We consider a basic planetary system composed by a Sun like star, a Jupiter-like planet an a Neptune-like planet in a wide range of orbital configurations not limited to the hierarchical case. We present atlases of resonances showing the…