Related papers: Disintegrating Rocky Exoplanets
As we begin to discover rocky planets in the habitable zone of nearby stars with missions like TESS and CHEOPS, we will need quick advancements on instrumentation and observational techniques that will enable us to answer key science…
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'')…
Exoplanets, short for `extra solar planets', are planets outside our solar system. They are objects with masses less than around 15 Jupiter-masses that orbit stars other than the Sun. They are small enough so they can not burn deuterium in…
We investigate the prospects for detecting dust from two body collisions during the late stages of planet formation at 1-150 AU. We develop an analytic model to describe the formation of a dusty cloud of debris and use numerical coagulation…
The discovery of Jupiter-mass planets in close orbits about their parent stars has challenged models of planet formation. Recent observations have shown that a number of these planets have highly inclined, sometimes retrograde orbits about…
Planetary material accreted by white dwarfs provides unique insights regarding exoplanetary composition. The evolutionary pathways of planetary bodies around white dwarfs are crucial to understanding the presence of close-in planetary…
Flattened, rotating disks of cool dust and gas extending for tens to hundreds of AU are found around almost all low mass stars shortly after their birth. These disks generally persist for several Myr, during which time some material…
Hundreds of exoplanets between 1-1.8 times the size of the Earth have been discovered on close in orbits. However, these planets show such a diversity in densities that some appear to be made entirely of iron, while others appear to host…
Exoplanets, with their large volumes and low temperatures, are ideal celestial detectors for probing dark matter (DM) interactions. DM particles can lose energy through scattering with the planetary interior and become gravitationally…
In the near future we will have ground- and space-based telescopes that are designed to observe and characterize Earth-like planets. While attention is focused on exoplanets orbiting main sequence stars, more than 150 exoplanets have…
Identification of habitable planets beyond our solar system is a key goal of current and future space missions. Yet habitability depends not only on the stellar irradiance, but equally on constituent parts of the planetary atmosphere. Here…
Many of the directly imaged self-luminous gas giant exoplanets have been found to have cloudy atmospheres. Scattering of the emergent thermal radiation from these planets by the dust grains in their atmospheres should locally give rise to…
Dust gaps and rings appear ubiquitous in bright protoplanetary disks. Disk-planet interaction with dust-trapping at the edges of planet-induced gaps is one plausible explanation. However, the sharpness of some observed dust rings indicate…
Hot giant exoplanets are very exotic objects with no equivalent in the Solar System that allow us to study the behavior of atmospheres under extreme conditions. Their thermal and chemical day--night dichotomies associated with extreme wind…
The basic geometry of the Solar System -- the shapes, spacings, and orientations of the planetary orbits -- has long been a subject of fascination as well as inspiration for planet formation theories. For exoplanetary systems, those same…
For exoplanet direct detection mission concepts such as Terrestrial Planet Finder or Exoplanet Probe, light from the exozodiacal dust tends to obscure any exoplanets present in the image. Data analysis methods to identify point sources…
The study of exoplanetary atmospheres is one of the most exciting and dynamic frontiers in astronomy. Over the past two decades ongoing surveys have revealed an astonishing diversity in the planetary masses, radii, temperatures, orbital…
When we are fortunate enough to view an exoplanetary system nearly edge-on, the star and planet periodically eclipse each other. Observations of eclipses (transits and occultations) provide a bonanza of information that cannot be obtained…
Recently discovered exoplanets on close-in orbits should have surface temperatures of 100's to 1000's of K. They are likely tidally locked and synchronously rotating around their parent stars and, if an atmosphere is absent, have surface…
The Sun shows a $\sim 10$% depletion in refractory elements relative to nearby solar twins. It has been suggested that this depletion is a signpost of planet formation. The exoplanet statistics are now good enough to show that the origin of…