Related papers: Setting the Stage for Habitable Planets
For centuries, humanity wondered if there were other worlds like ours in the Universe. For about a quarter of a century, we have known that planetary systems exist around other stars, and more than 3800 exoplanetary systems have been…
Characterizing the atmospheres of extrasolar planets is the new frontier in exoplanetary science. The last two decades of exoplanet discoveries have revealed that exoplanets are very common and extremely diverse in their orbital and bulk…
This chapter reviews the most recent advancements on the topic of terrestrial and giant planet interiors, including Solar System and extrasolar objects. Starting from an observed mass-radius diagram for known planets in the Universe, we…
The characterization of exoplanets and their birth protoplanetary disks has enormously advanced in the last decade. Benefitting from that, our global understanding of the planet formation processes has been substantially improved. In this…
The key goals of the astrobiology community are to identify environments beyond Earth that may be habitable, and to search for signs of life in those environments. A fundamental aspect of understanding the limits of habitable environments…
One of the most surprising discoveries of extrasolar planets is the detection of planets in moderately close binary star systems. The Jovian-type planets in the two binaries of Gamma Cephei and GJ 86 have brought to the forefront questions…
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 diversity in mass and composition of planetary atmospheres stems from the different building blocks present in protoplanetary discs and from the different physical and chemical processes that these experience during the planetary…
We present stellar evolution models for 0.5 - 1.2 \Msol at scaled metallicities of 0.1 - 1.5 Z\sol and O/Fe values of 0.44 - 2.28 O/Fe\sol. The time dependent evolution of habitable zone boundaries are calculated for each stellar evolution…
We give a popular account of the present state of the research in the field of extra-solar planetary systems, popularly termed as exoplanets, with a brief overview of the techniques employed. We also discuss the question of habitability and…
The fates of planetary systems provide unassailable insights into their formation and represent rich cross-disciplinary dynamical laboratories. Mounting observations of post-main-sequence planetary systems necessitate a complementary level…
With improvements in exoplanet detection techniques, the number of multiple planet systems discovered is increasing, while the detection of potentially habitable Earth-mass planets remains complicated and thus requires new search…
In this contribution I summarize some recent successes, and focus on remaining challenges, in understanding the formation and evolution of planetary systems in the context of the Blue Dots initiative. Because our understanding is…
Imaging and resolved spectroscopy reveal varying environmental conditions in our dynamic solar system. Many key advances have focused on how these conditions change over time. Observatory-level commitments to conduct annual observations of…
Motivated by the possibility that different versions of the laws of physics could be realized within other universes, this paper delineates the galactic parameters that allow for habitable planets and revisits constraints on the amplitude…
Most mechanisms proposed for the formation of planets are modified versions of the mechanism proposed for the solar system. Here we argue that, in terms of those planetary systems which have been observed, the case for the solar system…
No matter how fascinating and exotic other terrestrial planets are revealed to be, nothing generates more excitement than announcements regarding their habitability. From the observation of Mars to present-day efforts toward Venus and the…
The transit method, during which a planet's presence is inferred by measuring the reduction in flux as it passes in front of its parent star, is a highly successful exoplanet detection and characterization technique. During transit, the…
Planets form and obtain their compositions in disks of gas and dust around young stars. The chemical compositions of these planet-forming disks regulate all aspects of planetary compositions from bulk elemental inventories to access to…
The notion of a Galactic Habitable Zone (GHZ), or regions of the Milky Way galaxy that preferentially maintain the conditions to sustain complex life, has recently gained attention due to the detection of numerous exoplanets and advances…