Related papers: Imaging Giant Protoplanets with the ELTs
A major outstanding question regarding the formation of planetary systems is whether wide-orbit giant planets form differently than close-in giant planets. We aim to establish constraints on two key parameters that are relevant for…
During the formation of rocky planets, the surface environments of growing protoplanets were dramatically different from those of present-day planets. The release of gravitational energy during accretion would have maintained a molten…
Direct-imaging surveys have looked for accreting planets through their accretion tracers such as H alpha but have been less fruitful than expected. However, up to now, hydrogen-line emission at accreting planets has been estimated primarily…
The origin of close-in giant planets is a key open question in planet formation theory. The two leading models are (i) formation at the outer disk followed by migration and (ii) in situ formation. In this work we determine the atmospheric…
A key scientific goal of exoplanet surveys is to characterize the underlying population of planets in the local galaxy. In particular, the properties of accreting protoplanets can inform the rates and physical processes of planet formation.…
The large eccentricities of many giant extrasolar planets may represent the endpoint of gravitational scattering in initially more crowded systems. If so, the early evolution of the giant planets is likely to be more restrictive of…
The formation of gas giant planets is assumed to be preceded by the emergence of solid cores in the conventional sequential-accretion paradigm. This hypothesis implies that the presence of earth-like planets can be inferred from the…
We present preliminary results from our spectroscopic search for planets within 1 AU of metal-poor field dwarfs using NASA time with HIRES on Keck I. The core accretion model of gas giant planet formation is sensitive to the metallicity of…
Recent observations of protoplanets embedded in circumstellar disks have shed light on the planet formation process. In particular, detection of hydrogen Balmer-line (H{\alpha}) emission gives direct constraints on late-stage accretion onto…
The majority of discovered exoplanetary systems harbour a new class of planets, bodies typically several times more massive than Earth but orbiting their host stars well inside the orbit of Mercury. The origin of these close-in super-Earths…
New images of young stars are revolutionizing our understanding of planet formation. ALMA detects large grains in planet-forming disks with few AU scale resolution and scattered light imaging with extreme adaptive optics systems reveal…
Direct imaging (DI) surveys suggest that gas giants beyond 20 AU are rare around FGK stars. However, it is not clear what this means for the formation frequency of Gravitational Instability (GI) protoplanets due to uncertainties in gap…
We present models of giant planet migration in evolving protoplanetary disks. Our disks evolve subject to viscous transport of angular momentum and photoevaporation, while planets undergo Type II migration. We use a Monte Carlo approach,…
Context: While sub-micron- and micron-sized dust grains are generally well mixed with the gas phase in protoplanetary disks, larger grains will be partially decoupled and as a consequence have a different distribution from that of the gas.…
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…
Planets form in the discs of gas and dust that surround young stars. It is not known whether gas giant planets on wide orbits form the same way as Jupiter or by fragmentation of gravitationally unstable discs. Here we show that a giant…
Migration of dense gaseous clumps that form in young protostellar disks via gravitational fragmentation is investigated to determine the likelihood of giant planet formation. High-resolution numerical hydrodynamics simulations in the…
The formation of cold gas giants similar to Jupiter and Saturn in orbit and mass is a great challenge for planetesimal-driven core accretion models because the core growth rates far from the star are low. Here we model the growth and…
Planets are often invoked as the cause of inferred gaps or inner clearings in transition disks. These putative planets would interact with the remnant circumstellar disk, accreting gas and generating substantial luminosity. Here I explore…
While it is widely accepted that planets are formed in protoplanetary disks, there is still much debate on when this process happens. In a few cases protoplanets have been directly imaged, but for the vast majority of systems, disk gaps and…