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The discovery of a planet around the closest star to our Sun, Proxima Centauri, represents a quantum leap in the testability of exoplanetary models. Unlike any other discovered exoplanet, models of Proxima b could be contrasted against near…
Proxima b is a planet with a minimum mass of 1.3 MEarth orbiting within the habitable zone (HZ) of Proxima Centauri, a very low-mass, active star and the Sun's closest neighbor. Here we investigate a number of factors related to the…
I simulate the evolution of a stellar system hosting two stellar populations whose initial set up is defined according to the two main scenarios proposed for the origin of multiple populations in Galactic globular clusters: (i) formation of…
At a distance of about 4.22 lightyears, it would take about 100,000 years for humans to visit our closest stellar neighbor Proxima Centauri using modern chemical thrusters. New technologies are now being developed that involve high-power…
The Kepler mission has shown that a significant fraction of all stars may have an Earth-size habitable planet. A dramatic support was the recent detection of Proxima Centauri b. Using a Drake-equation like formalism I derive an equation for…
Interstellar communications are achievable with gram-scale spacecraft using swarm techniques introduced herein if an adequate energy source, clocks and a suitable communications protocol exist. The essence of our approach to the…
Due to its Earth-like minimum mass of 1.27 M$_{\text{E}}$ and its close proximity to our Solar system, Proxima Centauri b is one of the most interesting exoplanets for habitability studies. Its host star, Proxima Centauri, is however a…
We report Spitzer Space Telescope observations during predicted transits of the exoplanet Proxima Centauri b. As the nearest terrestrial habitable-zone planet we will ever discover, any potential transit of Proxima b would place strong…
The architecture of a large interstellar spaceship, which is capable of serving as a living environment for a population over many generations, is mainly dictated by the needs of said population in terms of food, water and breathable gases.…
We calculate the upper bounds of the population of theoretically stable Centaur orbits between Uranus and Neptune. These small bodies are on low-eccentricity, low-inclination orbits in two specific bands of semi-major axis, centred at…
We apply a mathematical model for photosynthesis to quantitatively assess the habitability of a hypothetical planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, inside the so called habitability zone. Results suggest significant viability for primary…
As new concepts of sending interstellar spacecraft to the nearest stars are now being investigated by various research teams, crucial questions about the timing of such a vast financial and labor investment arise. If humanity could build…
We present a study of four different formation scenarios that may be able to explain the origin of the recently announced planet (`Proxima b') orbiting Proxima Centauri. The aim is to examine how the formation scenarios differ in their…
Small planets are extremely common in the Galaxy, including planets with masses and radii between those of Earth and Neptune. Characterizing these planets' masses requires ultra-precise radial velocities. The ESPRESSO spectrograph was…
This paper introduces a novel Monte Carlo (MC) method to simulate the evolution of the low-earth orbit environment, enhancing the MIT Orbital Capacity Analysis Tool (MOCAT). In recent decades, numerous space environment models have been…
We consider the formation and migration of protoplanetary embryos in disks around the stars in tight binary systems (separations ~ 20 AU. In such systems, the initial stages of runaway embryo formation are expected to only take place within…
The search for exoplanets has encompassed a broad range of stellar environments, from single stars in the solar neighborhood to multiple stars and various open clusters. The stellar environment has a profound effect on planet formation and…
The bright, nearby binary $\alpha$ Centauri provides an excellent laboratory for testing stellar evolution models, as it is one of the few stellar systems for which we have high-precision classical (mass, radius, luminosity) and…
The vast majority of the orbital population today is unobservable and untracked because of their small size. These lethal non-trackable objects will only become more numerous as more payloads and debris are launched into orbit and increase…
Proxima Centauri b, an Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of our nearest stellar neighbour, has just been discovered. A theoretical framework of synchronously rotating planets, in which the risk of a runaway greenhouse on the sunlight…