Related papers: Lava Worlds: From Early Earth to Exoplanets
Climate transitions on exoplanets offer valuable insights into the atmospheric processes governing planetary habitability. Previous pure-steam atmospheric models show a thermal limit in outgoing long-wave radiation, which has been used to…
The characterization of exoplanets and their birth protoplanetary disks has enormously advanced in the last decade. Benefitting from that, our global understanding of the planet formation processes has been substantially improved. In this…
Earth's geodynamo has operated for over 3.5 billion years. The magnetic field is currently powered by thermocompositional convection in the outer core, which involves the release of light elements and latent heat as the inner core…
We demonstrate that the deep volatile storage capacity of magma oceans has significant implications for the bulk composition, interior and climate state inferred from exoplanet mass and radius data. Experimental petrology provides the…
A sufficient amount of water is required at the surface to develop water oceans. A significant fraction of water, however, remains in the mantle during magma ocean solidification, and thus the existence of water oceans is not guaranteed…
Exoplanetary science continues to excite and surprise with its rich diversity. We discuss here some key aspects potentially influencing the range of exoplanetary terrestrial-type atmospheres which could exist in nature. We are motivated by…
During their formation and early evolution, rocky planets undergo multiple global melting events due to accretionary collisions with other protoplanets. The detection and characterization of their post-collision afterglows (magma oceans)…
The formation of the Earth's core is a consequence of planetary accretion and processes in the Earth's interior. The mechanical process of planetary differentiation is likely to occur in large, if not global, magma oceans created by the…
Massive steam and CO$_2$ atmospheres have been proposed for magma ocean outgassing of Earth and terrestrial planets. Yet formation of such atmospheres depends on volatile exchange with the molten interior, governed by volatile solubilities…
Despite great advances in our understanding of the formation of the Solar System, the evolution of the Earth, and the chemical basis for life, we are not much closer than the ancient Greeks to an answer of whether life has arisen and…
The lunar farside highlands, referred to as the lunar farside thicker crust compared with the nearside crust, presents a challenge to the theory of formation and evolution of the Moon. Here, we show that, after the Moon reached synchronous…
Tidally locked lava planets are hot, rocky worlds on close-in orbits with a permanent molten dayside. With JWST, their surfaces and atmospheres are beginning to be revealed. This work investigates 3D magma-ocean dynamics, derives scaling…
Gas-giant exoplanets are test cases for theories of planet formation as their atmospheres are proposed to carry signatures of their formation within the protoplanetary disk. The metallicity and C/O are key diagnostics, allowing to…
Galaxy formation is at the heart of our understanding of cosmic evolution. Although there is a consensus that galaxies emerged from the expanding matter background by gravitational instability of primordial fluctuations, a number of…
The standard model for planet formation is a bottom-up process in which the origin of rocky and gaseous planets can be traced back to the collision of micron-sized dust grains within the gas-rich environment of protoplanetary disks. Key…
The discovery of planets orbiting stars other than the Sun has accelerated over the past decade, and this trend will continue as new space- and ground-based observatories employ next-generation instrumentation to search the skies for…
The varied surfaces and atmospheres of planets make them interesting places to live, explore, and study from afar. Unfortunately, the great distance to exoplanets makes it impossible to resolve their disk with current or near-term…
In the last few years astronomical surveys have expanded the reach of planetary science into the realm of small and dense extrasolar worlds. These share a number of characteristics with the terrestrial and icy planetary objects of the Solar…
Results from recent space missions, in particular Spitzer and Herschel, have lead to significant progress in our understanding of the formation and transport of water from clouds to disks, planetesimals, and planets. In this review, we…
Atmospheric compositions for rocky exoplanets will depend strongly on the bulk planetary composition and the orbital position of the planet. Non-traditional gases may be present in the atmospheres of exceptionally hot planets. Atmospheres…