Related papers: The Pseudo-zodi Problem for Edge-on Planetary Syst…

Context. Clouds have already been detected in exoplanetary atmospheres. They play crucial roles in a planet's atmosphere and climate and can also create ambiguities in the determination of atmospheric parameters such as trace gas mixing…

The presence of planets in binary systems poses interesting problems for planet formation theories, both in cases where planets must have formed in very compact discs around the individual stars and where they are located near the edge of…

We explore the minimum distance from a host star where an exoplanet could potentially be habitable in order not to discard close-in rocky exoplanets for follow-up observations. We find that the inner edge of the Habitable Zone for hot…

We analyze how the process of dust settling affects the spectral energy distribution and optical appearance of protoplanetary disks. Using simple analytic estimates on the one hand, and detailed 1+1-D models on the other hand, we show that,…

We present simulated observations of the Doppler shifts of the solar Mg I Fraunhofer line scattered by asteroidal, cometary, and trans-Neptunian dust particles. The studies are based on the results of integrations of orbital evolution of…

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…

Jupiter and Saturn have extended, nearly toroidal atmospheres composed of material ejected from their moons or rings. Here we suggest that similar atmospheres must exist around giant extrasolar planets and might be observable in a transit…

We present corrections for the change in the apparent scalelengths, central surface brightnesses and axis ratios due to the presence of dust in pure disk galaxies, as a function of inclination, central face-on opacity in the B-band…

The mass density of dust particles that form from asteroids and comets in the interplanetary medium of the solar system is, near 1 AU, comparable to the mass density of the solar wind. It is mainly contained in particles of micrometer size…

We study the outflow of dust particles on the surface layers of optically thick disks. At the surface of disks around young stars, small dust particles (size < 10 micron) experience stellar radiation pressure support and orbit more slowly…

The Hunt for Observable Signatures of Terrestrial planetary Systems (HOSTS) on the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer will survey nearby stars for faint emission arising from ~300 K dust (exozodiacal dust), and aims to determine the…

Debris disks are thought to be sculptured by neighboring planets. The same is true for the Edgeworth-Kuiper debris disk, yet no direct observational evidence for signatures of giant planets in the Kuiper belt dust distribution has been…

Rapid orbital drift of macroscopic dust particles is one of the major obstacles against planetesimal formation in protoplanetary disks. We reexamine this problem by considering porosity evolution of dust aggregates. We apply a porosity…

Dust and stars in the plane of the Milky Way create a "Zone of Avoidance" in the extragalactic sky. Galaxies are distributed in gigantic labyrinth formations, filaments and great walls with occasional dense clusters. They can be traced all…

Exocomets scattered by planets have been invoked to explain observations in multiple contexts, including the frequently found near- and mid-infrared excess around nearby stars arising from exozodiacal dust. Here we investigate how the…

Transitional discs are a special type of protoplanetary discs where planet formation is thought to be taking place. These objects feature characteristic inner cavities and/or gaps of a few tens of AUs in the sub-millimitre images of the…

Clouds have a strong impact on the climate of planetary atmospheres. The potential scattering greenhouse effect of CO2 ice clouds in the atmospheres of terrestrial extrasolar planets is of particular interest because it might influence the…

Context. We are creating the AKARI mid-infrared all-sky diffuse maps. Through a foreground removal of the zodiacal emission, we serendipitously detected a bright residual component whose angular size is about 50 x 20 deg. at a wavelength of…

Observations of protoplanetary disks (PPDs) at sub-mm wavelengths suggest that polarisation is caused by scattering of thermal radiation. Most of the dust models that are used to explain these observations have major drawbacks: They either…

High contrast imaging searches for exoplanets have been conducted on 2.4-10 m telescopes, typically at H band (1.6 microns) and used exposure times of ~1 hr to search for planets with semi-major axes of > ~10 AU. We are beginning to plan…