Related papers: Giant Planets
A short introduction is given to astrophysics of neutron stars and to physics of dense matter in neutron stars. Observed properties of astrophysical objects containing neutron stars are discussed. Current scenarios regarding formation and…
In the coming years, it is likely that the first potentially Earth-like planets will be discovered orbiting other stars. Once found, the characterisation of those planets will play a vital role in determining which will be chosen as the…
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,…
Despite many similarities, there are significant observed differences between Uranus and Neptune: while Uranus is tilted and has a regular set of satellites, suggesting their accretion from a disk, Neptune's moons are irregular and are…
With more than 260 extrasolar planetary systems discovered to-date, the search for habitable planets has found new grounds. Unlike our solar system, the stars of many of these planets are hosts to eccentric or close-in giant bodies. Several…
Recent observations have indicated a strong connection between compact ($a \lesssim 0.5$ au) super-Earth and mini-Neptune systems and their outer ($a \gtrsim$ a few au) giant planet companions. We study the dynamical evolution of such inner…
Since the discovery of the first extra-solar planets, we are confronted with the puzzling diversity of planetary systems. Processes like planet radial migration in gas-disks and planetary orbital instabilities, often invoked to explain the…
The long-term evolution of the outer Solar System is subject to the influence of the giant planets, however, perturbations from other massive bodies located in the region imprint secular signatures, that are discernible in long-term…
Most observed extrasolar planets have masses similar to, but orbits very different from, the gas giants of our solar system. Many are much closer to their parent stars than would have been expected and their orbits are often rather…
In order to characterize giant exoplanets and better understand their origin, knowledge of how the planet's composition depends on its mass and stellar environment is required. In this work, we simulate the thermal evolution of gaseous…
These notes provide an introduction to the theory of the formation and early evolution of planetary systems. Topics covered include the structure, evolution and dispersal of protoplanetary disks; the formation of planetesimals, terrestrial…
Extrasolar planets abound in almost any possible configuration. However, until five years ago, there was a lack of planets orbiting closer than 0.5 au to giant or subgiant stars. Since then, recent detections have started to populated this…
We briefly examine the properties of dense plasmas characteristic of the interior of giant planets and the atmospheres of neutron stars. Special attention is devoted to the equation of state of hydrogen and helium at high density and to the…
We review our current understanding of the interior structure and thermal evolution of Saturn, with a focus on recent results in the Cassini era. There has been important progress in understanding physical inputs, including equations of…
Super-Earths and sub-Neptunes represent the most common class of exoplanets discovered to date in our galaxy, yet they have no direct analogues in the Solar System. Since 2014, researchers within the NCCR PlanetS have made significant…
Various problems of the formation and evolution of planetary systems are studied. Most of the studies are devoted to the Solar System. The collapse of the presolar cloud and the accumulation of planets are studied. The author considers the…
Recent surveys have revealed a lack of close-in planets around evolved stars more massive than 1.2 Msun. Such planets are common around solar-mass stars. We have calculated the orbital evolution of planets around stars with a range of…
Exoplanet demographics increasingly reveal that planetary properties depend not only on local irradiation and composition but also on the wider system architecture. We analyse a sample of Neptune-sized short-period planets with…
We present an analysis of X-ray observations of the trans-Jovian planets Saturn, Uranus and Neptune with the ROSAT PSPC in comparison with X-ray observations of Jupiter. For the first time a marginal X-ray detection of Saturn was found and…
The existence of Uranus and Neptune presents severe difficulties for the core accretion model for the formation of ice giant planets. We suggest an alternative mechanism, namely disk instability leading to the formation of gas giant…