Related papers: How Common are Extrasolar, Late Heavy Bombardments…
If the Sun was born in a relatively compact open cluster, it is quite likely that a massive (10MSun) star was nearby when it exploded in a supernova. The repercussions of a supernova can be rather profound, and the current Solar System may…
"The investigation into the possible effects of cosmic rays on living organisms will also offer great interest." - Victor F. Hess, Nobel Lecture, December 12, 1936 High-energy radiation bursts are commonplace in our Universe. From nearby…
The eccentric orbits of the known extrasolar giant planets provide evidence that most planet-forming environments undergo violent dynamical instabilities. Here, we numerically simulate the impact of giant planet instabilities on planetary…
The Kepler mission results indicate that systems of tightly-packed inner planets (STIPs) are present around of order 5% of FGK field stars (whose median age is ~5 Gyr). We propose that STIPs initially surrounded nearly all such stars and…
The solar system was most likely born in a star cluster containing at least 1000 stars. It is highly probable that this cluster environment influenced various properties of the solar system like its chemical composition, size and the…
We estimate the frequency of intermittent hypermutation events and disruptions of planetary/satellite photochemistry due to ultraviolet radiation from core collapse supernova explosions. Calculations are presented for planetary systems in…
This chapter concerns the long-term dynamical evolution of planetary systems from both theoretical and observational perspectives. We begin by discussing the planet-planet interactions that take place within our own Solar System. We then…
The dynamical structure of the Solar System can be explained by a period of orbital instability experienced by the giant planets. While a late instability was originally proposed to explain the Late Heavy Bombardment, recent work favors an…
We provide a fast method for computing constraints on impactor pre-impact orbits, applying this to the late giant impacts in the Solar System. These constraints can be used to make quick, broad comparisons of different collision scenarios,…
Previous studies of cometary impacts in the outer Solar System used the spatial distribution of ecliptic comets (ECs) from dynamical models that assumed ECs began on low-inclination orbits (<5 deg) in the Kuiper belt. In reality, the source…
(Shortened) We have used the measured properties of the stars in the 79 exoplanetary systems with one or more planets that have been observed in transit, to estimate each system's present habitability. The measured stellar properties have…
Cosmic collisions on planets cause detectable optical flashes that range from terrestrial shooting stars to bright fireballs. On June 3, 2010 a bolide in Jupiter's atmosphere was simultaneously observed from the Earth by two amateur…
Stellar X-ray and UV radiation can significantly affect the survival, composition, and long-term evolution of the atmospheres of planets in or near their host star's habitable zone (HZ). Especially interesting are planetary systems in the…
We analyze two new sets of coagulation calculations for solid particles orbiting within the terrestrial zone of a solar-type star. In models of collisional cascades, numerical simulations demonstrate that the total mass, the mass in 1 mm…
We present numerical simulations of planetary systems in star clusters with different initial stellar densities, to investigate the impact of the density on debris disc dynamics. We use LPS+ to combine N-body codes NBODY6++GPU and REBOUND…
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,…
Over the past two years, the search for low-mass extrasolar planets has led to the detection of seven so-called 'hot Neptunes' or 'super-Earths' around Sun-like stars. These planets have masses 5-20 times larger than the Earth and are…
Planetary habitability is in part determined by the atmospheric evolution of a planet; one key component of such evolution is escape of heavy ions to space. Ion loss processes are sensitive to the plasma environment of the planet, dictated…
For centuries, our knowledge of planetary systems and ideas about planet formation were based on a single example, our solar system. During the last thirteen years, the discovery of ~170 planetary systems has ushered in a new era for…
Following recent suggestions of a gamma-ray burst origin of large ISM holes (supershells) detected in the galaxy, we discuss the effects of the recently discovered shell GSH 238+00+09 (and other nearby extremely energetic supershells) on…