Related papers: A Minimum Mass Nebula for M Dwarfs
The orbital eccentricity-radius relation for small planets is indicative of the predominant dynamical sculpting processes during late-stage orbital evolution. Previous studies have shown that planets orbiting Sun-like stars exhibit an…
Only a few well characterized very low-mass M dwarfs are known today. Our understanding of M dwarfs is vital as these are the most common stars in our solar neighborhood. We aim to characterize the properties of a rare F+dM stellar system…
We present numerical solutions of the collapse of prestellar cores that lead to the formation and evolution of circumstellar disks. The disk evolution is then followed for up to three million years. A variety of models of different initial…
If interstellar objects originate in protoplanetary disks, they can be used to calibrate the fraction of mass that such disks eject. The discoveries of interstellar objects 1I/`Oumuamua and 2I/Borisov, taken together with rogue planets…
Recent observations of debris discs, believed to be made up of remnant planetesimals, brought a number of surprises. Debris disc presence does not correlate with the host star's metallicity, and may anti-correlate with the presence of gas…
We report on precise Doppler measurements of L231-32 (TOI-270), a nearby M dwarf ($d=22$ pc, $M_\star = 0.39$ M$_\odot$, $R_\star = 0.38$ R$_\odot$), which hosts three transiting planets that were recently discovered using data from the…
We present some results from a systematic survey for disks around spectroscopically identified young brown dwarfs and very low mass stars. We find that ~75% of our sample show intrinsic IR excesses, indicative of circum(sub)stellar disks.…
We investigate the role of stellar mass in shaping the intrinsic thickness of galaxy discs by determining the probability distribution of apparent axis ratios (b/a) for two different samples that probe the faint end of the galaxy luminosity…
We re-analyzed the Herschel/PACS data of a sample of 55 brown dwarfs (BDs) and very low mass stars with spectral types ranging from M5.5 to L0. We investigated the dependence of disk structure on the mass of the central object in the…
We analyze two new sets of coagulation calculations for solid particles orbiting within the terrestrial zone of a solar-type star. In models of collisional cascades, numerical simulations demonstrate that the total mass, the mass in 1 mm…
The dust disks observed around mature stars are evidence that plantesimals are present in these systems on spatial scales that are similar to that of the asteroids and the KBOs in the Solar System. These dust disks (a.k.a. ``debris disks'')…
Cold Jovian planets play an important role in sculpting the dynamical environment in which inner terrestrial planets form. The core accretion model predicts that giant planets cannot form around low-mass M dwarfs, although this idea has…
We present near- and mid-infrared photometry and spectroscopy from PAIRITEL, IRTF, and Spitzer of a metallicity-unbiased sample of 117 cool, hydrogen-atmosphere white dwarfs from the Palomar-Green survey and find five with excess radiation…
Using the cumulative catalog of planets detected by the NASA Kepler mission, we reconstruct the intrinsic occurrence of Earth- to Neptune-size (1 - 4$R_{\oplus}$) planets and their distributions with radius and orbital period. We analyze…
The Minimum Mass Solar Nebula (MMSN) is a protoplanetary disk that contains the minimum amount of solids necessary to build the planets of the Solar System. Assuming that the giant planets formed in the compact configuration they have at…
We report the discovery of a dwarf protoplanetary disk around the star XZ Tau B that shows all the features of a classical transitional disk but on a much smaller scale. The disk has been imaged with the Atacama Large…
The fundamental properties of low-mass stars are not as well understood as those of their more massive counterparts. The best method for constraining these properties, especially masses and radii, is to study eclipsing binary systems, but…
We have carried out a sensitive search for gas emission lines at infrared and millimeter wavelengths for a sample of 15 young sun-like stars selected from our dust disk survey with the Spitzer Space Telescope. We have used mid-infrared…
We present high resolution millimeter continuum and CO line observations for the circumbinary disk around V892 Tau to constrain the stellar and disk properties. The total mass of the two near-equal-mass A stars is estimated to be…
Using the Spitzer Space Telescope, we have observed 90 weak-line and classical T Tauri stars in the vicinity of the Ophiuchus, Lupus, Chamaeleon, and Taurus star-forming regions as part of the Cores to Disks (c2d) Spitzer Legacy project. In…