Related papers: First Earth-based Detection of a Superbolide on Ju…
It has long been thought that the presence of a giant planet is a pre-requisite for the development of life on potentially habitable planets. Without Jupiter, it was argued, the Earth would have been subject to a punishing impact regime,…
It has long been assumed that the planet Jupiter acts as a giant shield, significantly lowering the impact rate of minor bodies upon the Earth, and thus enabling the development and evolution of life in a collisional environment which is…
In recent years a large number of Hot Jupiters orbiting in a very close orbit around the parent stars have been explored with the transit and doppler effect methods. Here in this work we study the gravitational microlensing effect of a…
We observed Jupiter at wavelengths near 2 cm with the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array in February 2015. These frequencies are mostly sensitive to variations in ammonia abundance and probe between ~0.5-2.0 bars of pressure in Jupiter's…
We discuss a hypothetical existential threat from a 10 km diameter bolide discovered 6 months prior to impact with one case being a comet and the other being an asteroid. We show that an extension of our work on bolide fragmentation using…
In Jupiter's stratosphere, gaseous carbon monosulfide (CS) was first discovered in 1994 by millimeter and ultraviolet observations as a product induced by the collision of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 (SL9). {To constrain sulfur chemistry, in…
Impact ejecta with velocities exceeding the escape velocity of planetary bodies become meteorites and dust particles in interplanetary space. We present a new method that allows simultaneous measurement of the size and velocity of the…
For many years, it was assumed that Jupiter prevented the Earth from being subject to a punishing impact regime that would greatly hinder the development of life. Here, we present the 4th in a series of studies investigating this…
Hot Jupiters receive intense incident stellar light on their daysides, which drives vigorous atmospheric circulation that attempts to erase their large dayside-to-nightside flux contrasts. Propagating waves and instabilities in hot Jupiter…
We analyze lunar impact flashes recorded by our team during runs in December 2007, 2011, 2013 and 2014. In total, 12 impact flashes with magnitudes ranging between 7.1 and 9.3 in V band were identified. From these, 9 events could be linked…
It is customarily assumed that Earth-striking meteoroids are completely random, and that all the impacts must be interpreted as uncorrelated events distributed according to Poisson statistics. If this is correct, their impact dates must be…
Micron size extrasolar dust particles have been convincingly detected by satellites. Larger extrasolar meteoroids (5-35 microns) have most likely been detected by ground based radar at Arecibo and New Zealand. We present estimates of the…
Radial velocity surveys suggest that the Solar System may be unusual and that Jupiter-like planets have a frequency <20% around solar-type stars. However, they may be much more common in one of the closest associations in the solar…
Hot Jupiters, giant extrasolar planets with orbital periods shorter than ~10 days, have long been thought to form at large radial distances, only to subsequently experience long-range inward migration. Here, we propose that in contrast with…
The arrival of solid particles from outside our solar system would present us with an invaluable source of scientific information. Attempts to detect such interstellar particles among the meteors observed in Earth's atmosphere have almost…
Hot Jupiters receive intense irradiation from their stellar hosts. The resulting extreme environments in their atmospheres allow us to study the conditions that drive planetary atmospheric dynamics, e.g., global-scale winds. General…
We explore the appearance of terrestrial planets in formation by studying the emergent spectra of hot molten protoplanets during their collisional formation. While such collisions are rare, the surfaces of these bodies may remain hot at…
We present our astrometric observations of the small near-Earth object 2011~MD ($H \sim 28.0$), obtained after its very close fly-by to Earth in June 2011. Our set of observations extends the observational arc to $73$ days, and together…
We report on the detection of the secondary eclipse of the very-hot Jupiter OGLE-TR-56b from combined z-band time series photometry obtained with the VLT and Magellan telescopes. We measure a flux decrement of 0.0363+/-0.0091 percent from…
During its late orbital mission at Jupiter the Galileo spacecraft made two passages through the giant planet's gossamer ring system. The impact-ionization dust detector on board successfully recorded dust impacts during both ring passages…