Related papers: Composition of Solar System Small Bodies
Since the discovery of the first extra-solar planets, we are confronted with the puzzling diversity of planetary systems. Processes like planet radial migration in gas-disks and planetary orbital instabilities, often invoked to explain the…
The goal of the Ariel space mission is to observe a large and diversified population of transiting planets around a range of host star types to collect information on their atmospheric composition. The planetary bulk and atmospheric…
Accurate mass and radius measurements of small transiting exoplanets are essential for probing their compositions, formation histories, and potential habitability. We present a uniform analysis of six planetary systems (each hosting at…
[abridged] In the typical giant-impact scenario for the Moon formation most of the Moon's material originates from the impactor. Any Earth-impactor composition difference should, therefore, correspond to a comparable Earth-Moon composition…
We know that giant planets played a crucial role in the making of our Solar System. The discovery of giant planets orbiting other stars is a formidable opportunity to learn more about these objects, what is their composition, how various…
One of the most important developments in exoplanet science in the past decade is the discovery of multi-planet systems with sub-Neptune-sized planets interior to 1~AU. This chapter explores the architectures of these planetary systems,…
We discuss our current understanding of the interior structure and thermal evolution of giant planets. This includes the gas giants, such as Jupiter and Saturn, that are primarily composed of hydrogen and helium, as well as the "ice…
Transiting planet surveys like Kepler have provided a wealth of information on the distribution of planetary radii, particularly for the new populations of super-Earth and sub-Neptune sized planets. In order to aid in the physical…
Deep elemental composition is a challenging measurement to achieve in the giant planets of the solar system. Yet, knowledge of the deep composition offers important insights in the internal structure of these planets, their evolutionary…
By plotting empirical chemical element abundances on Earth relative to the Sun and normalized to silicon versus their first ionization potentials, we confirm the existence of a correlation reported earlier. To explain this, we develop a…
The bulk compositions of small planets ($R_p< 2 \mathrm{R}_\oplus$) are directly linked to their formation histories, making reliable compositional constraints imperative for testing models of planet formation and evolution. Because…
A planetary system consists of a host star and one or more planets, arranged into a particular configuration. Here, we consider what information belongs to the configuration, or ordering, of 4286 Kepler planets in their 3277 planetary…
Giant planets dominate the mass of many planetary systems, including the Solar System, and represent the best-characterized class of extrasolar planets. Understanding the formation of giant planets bridges the high mass end of the planet…
Objects in the Kuiper belt are small and far away thus difficult to study in detail even with the best telescopes available at earth. For much of the early history of the Kuiper belt, studies of the compositions of these objects were…
This paper reviews selected aspects of the growth of cosmological structure, covering the following general areas: (1) expected characteristics of linear density perturbations according to various candidate theories for the origin of…
Although there is abundant and diverse observational evidence in support of white dwarf stars hosting planets or debris disks which form in the catastrophic destruction of various planetary bodies, the key processes that explain these…
The architecture and evolution of planetary systems are shaped in part by stellar flybys. Within this context, we look at stellar encounters which are too weak to immediately destabilize a planetary system but are nevertheless strong enough…
Radio wavelength observations of solar system bodies are a powerful method of probing many characteristics of those bodies. From surface and subsurface, to atmospheres (including deep atmospheres of the giant planets), to rings, to the…
Debris disks are tenuous, dust-dominated disks commonly observed around stars over a wide range of ages. Those around main sequence stars are analogous to the Solar System's Kuiper Belt and Zodiacal light. The dust in debris disks is…
The structure of planetary systems around their host stars depends on their initial formation conditions. Massive planets will likely be formed as a consequence of rapid migration of planetesimals and low mass cores into specific trapping…