Related papers: Effects of a planetesimal debris disk on stability…
In co-orbital planetary systems, two or more planets share the same orbit around their star. Here we test the dynamical stability of co-orbital rings of planets perturbed by outside forces. We test two setups: i) 'stationary' rings of…
Understanding the formation and dynamical evolution of habitable planets in extrasolar planetary systems is a challenging task. In this respect, systems with multiple giant planets and/or multiple stars present special complications. The…
Prior to the detection of its outermost Uranus-mass object, it had been suggested that GJ 876 could host an Earth-sized planet in a 15-day orbit. Observation, however, did not support this idea, but instead revealed evidence for the…
Disk fragmentation resulting from the gravitational instability has been proposed as an efficient mechanism for forming giant planets. We use the planet Fomalhaut b, the triple-planetary system HR 8799, and the potential protoplanet…
Most stars form as part of a stellar group. These young stars are mostly surrounded by a disk from which potentially a planetary system might form. Both, the disk and later on the planetary system, may be affected by the cluster environment…
The presence of dusty debris around main sequence stars denotes the existence of planetary systems. Such debris disks are often identified by the presence of excess continuum emission at infrared and (sub-)millimetre wavelengths, with…
Observations of exoplanets have revealed that systems with planets on closely-spaced orbits are common, which motivates the question "How closely can planets orbit to one another and still be dynamically-stable for very long times?". To…
High levels of exozodiacal dust are observed around a growing number of main sequence stars. The origin of such dust is not clear, given that it has a short lifetime against both collisions and radiative forces. Even a collisional cascade…
Circumstellar debris disks are the extrasolar analogues of the asteroid belt and the Kuiper belt. They consist of comets and leftover planetesimals that continuously collide and produce circumstellar dust that can be observed as infrared…
Recent observational missions have uncovered a significant number of compact multi-exoplanet systems. The tight orbital spacing of these systems has led to much effort being applied to the understanding of their stability; however, a key…
The main properties of the observed extrasolar planets are reviewed with respect to their relevance to the formation scenario of planetary systems. Results of numerical computations of embedded planets in viscously evolving disks are…
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…
A debris disk is a constituent of any planetary system surrounding a main sequence star. We study whether close stellar encounters can disrupt and strip a debris disk of its planetesimals in the expanding open cluster of its birth with a…
We know little about the outermost exoplanets in planetary systems, because our detection methods are insensitive to moderate-mass planets on wide orbits. However, debris discs can probe the outer-planet population, because dynamical…
We aim to investigate the influence of the eccentricity and inclination damping due to planet-disc interactions on the final configurations of the systems, generalizing previous studies on the combined action of the gas disc and…
We study the dynamical stability of planetary systems consisting of one hypothetical terrestrial mass planet ($1 $ or $10 \mearth$) and one massive planet ($10 \mearth - 10 \mjup$). We consider masses and orbits that cover the range of…
Planetesimals -- asteroids and comets -- are the building blocks of planets in protoplanetary discs and the source of dust, ice and gas in debris discs. Along with planets they comprise the left-over material after star formation that…
Substantial orbital migration of massive planets may occur in most extrasolar planetary systems. Since migration is likely to occur after a significant fraction of the dust has been locked up into planetesimals, ubiquitous migration could…
We compile a sample of 341 binary and multiple star systems with the aim of searching for and characterising Kuiper belt-like debris discs. The sample is assembled by combining several smaller samples studied in previously published work…
Young planetary systems are subjected to different dynamical effects that can influence their orbital structure over time. In systems with more than one planet, other planets can internally influence each other, e.g. via planet-planet…