Related papers: A Definition for Giant Planets Based on the Mass-D…

We have investigated the problem of the distribution of both masses and orbital radii of planets resulting from the gas-accretion, gas-capture model. First we followed the evolution of gas and solids from the moment where all solids are in…

As of August 2008, over 30 multiple exoplanet systems are known, and 28% of stars with planets show significant evidence of a second companion. I briefly review these 30 systems individually, broadly grouping them into five categories: 1)…

Exoplanets classified as super-Earths are commonly observed on short period orbits, close to their host stars, but their abundance on wider orbits is poorly constrained. Gravitational microlensing is sensitive to exoplanets on wide orbits.…

Forming giant planets by disk instability requires a gaseous disk that is massive enough to become gravitationally unstable and able to cool fast enough for self-gravitating clumps to form and survive. Models with simplified disk cooling…

As the descendants of stars with masses less than 8 M$_{\odot}$ on the main sequence, white dwarfs provide a unique way to constrain planetary occurrence around intermediate-mass stars (spectral types BAF) that are otherwise difficult to…

Recent imaging campaigns indicate the likely existence of massive planets (~ 1-10 MJ) on ~1000 year orbits about a few percent of stars. Such objects are not easily explained in most current planet formation models. In this Letter we use…

A handful of stars are known to host both an inner system of multiple transiting planets and an outer giant planet. These systems all feature a prominent gap between the orbits of two of the transiting planets, distinguishing them from…

The giant planet occurrence rate rises with orbital period out to at least $\sim$300 days. Large-scale planetary migration through the disk has long been suspected to be the physical origin of this feature, as the timescale of standard Type…

Observations of accretion disks around young brown dwarfs have led to the speculation that they may form planetary systems similar to normal stars. While there have been several detections of planetary-mass objects around brown dwarfs…

In the Solar System giant planets come in two flavours: 'gas giants' (Jupiter and Saturn) with massive gas envelopes and 'ice giants' (Uranus and Neptune) with much thinner envelopes around their cores. It is poorly understood how these two…

More than 450 exoplanets have currently been detected, most of them by the radial velocity (RV) technique. While the majority of exoplanets have been found around main-sequence (MS) FGK stars (M 1.5M*), only a small fraction (- 10%) have…

CONTEXT. Exoplanet searches have demonstrated that giant planets are preferentially found around metal-rich stars and that their fraction increases with the stellar mass. AIMS. During the past six years, we have conducted a radial velocity…

The sizes of small planets have been known to be bi-modal, with a gap separating planets that have lost their primordial atmospheres (super-Earths), and the ones that retain them (mini-Neptunes). Here, we report evidences for another…

High mass stars are hostile to Doppler measurements due to rotation and activity on the main-sequence, so radial velocity searches for planets around massive stars have relied on evolved stars. A large number of planets have been found…

The discovery of planets around massive stars is important for understanding how planet formation and evolution is conditioned by different stellar environments. However, current planetary search surveys have failed to detect planets around…

Results from gravitational microlensing suggested the existence of a large population of free-floating planetary mass objects. The main conclusion from this work was partly based on constraints from a direct imaging survey. This survey…

A growing number of low luminosity and low surface brightness astronomical objects challenge traditional notions of both galaxies and star clusters. To address this, we propose a definition of galaxy independent of the cold dark matter…

In the late stage of terrestrial planet formation, planets are predicted to undergo pairwise collisions known as giant impacts. Here we present a high-resolution database of giant impacts for differentiated colliding bodies of iron-silicate…

Terrestrial planets born beyond 1-3 AU have been theorized to avoid being engulfed during the red-giant phases of their host stars. Nevertheless, only a few gas-giant planets have been observed around white dwarfs (WDs) -- the end product…

We report new VLT/NACO imaging observations of the young, nearby brown dwarf 2MASSW J1207334-393254 and its suggested planetary mass companion (2M1207 b). Three epochs of VLT/NACO measurements obtained over nearly one year show that the…