Related papers: Lava Worlds: From Early Earth to Exoplanets
This review is based on lectures given at the 45th Saas-Fee Advanced Course 'From Protoplanetary Disks to Planet Formation' held in March 2015 in Les Diablerets, Switzerland. Starting with an overview of the main characterictics of the…
Exomoons may play an important role in determining the habitability of worlds outside of our solar system. They can stabilize conditions, alter the climate by breaking tidal locking with the parent star, drive tidal heating, and perhaps…
Terrestrial planets are thought to experience episode(s) of large-scale melting early in their history. Fractionation during magma-ocean freezing leads to unstable stratification within the related cumulate layers due to progressive iron…
In this chapter we review the astrophysical origins of Earth's carbon, starting from the products of the Big Bang and culminating with the Earth's formation. We review the measured compositions of different primitive objects including…
Recent ALMA observations on disk substructures suggest the presence of embedded protoplanets in a large number disks. The primordial configurations of these planetary systems can be deduced from the morphology of the disk substructure and…
Two decades ago, astronomers began detecting planets orbiting stars other than our Sun, so-called exoplanets. Since that time, the rate of detections and the sensitivity to ever-smaller planets has improved dramatically with several…
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…
The evolution of galactic disks from their early stages is dominated by gasdynamical effects such as gas infall, galactic fountains, and galactic outflows, and further more. The influence of these processes is only understandable in the…
Aims: The secondary atmospheres of terrestrial planets form and evolve as a consequence of interaction with the interior over geological time. We aim to quantify the influence of planetary bulk composition on the interior--atmosphere…
Protoplanetary disk surveys by the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (ALMA) are now probing a range of environmental conditions, from low-mass star-forming regions like Lupus to massive OB clusters like $\sigma$ Orionis. Here we…
Exoplanet surveys around M dwarfs have detected a growing number of exoplanets with Earth-like insolation. It is expected that some of those planets are rocky planets with the potential for temperate climates favourable to surface liquid…
Planetary habitability is in part determined by the atmospheric evolution of a planet; one key component of such evolution is escape of heavy ions to space. Ion loss processes are sensitive to the plasma environment of the planet, dictated…
Stars are fossils that retain the history of their host galaxies. Elements heavier than helium are created inside stars and are ejected when they die. From the spatial distribution of elements in galaxies, it is therefore possible to…
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…
Characterizing the atmospheres of extrasolar planets is the new frontier in exoplanetary science. The last two decades of exoplanet discoveries have revealed that exoplanets are very common and extremely diverse in their orbital and bulk…
Water vapour atmospheres with content equivalent to the Earth's oceans, resulting from impacts or a high insolation, were found to yield a surface magma ocean. This was, however, a consequence of assuming a fully convective structure. Here…
Giant planets acquire gas, ices and rocks during the early formation stages of planetary systems and thus inform us on the formation process itself. Proceeding from inside out, examining the connections between the deep interiors and the…
Interior compositions are key for our understanding of Earth-like exoplanets. The composition of the core can influence the presence of a magnetic dynamo and the strength of gravity on the planetary surface, both of which heavily impact…
Convective flow in Earth's iron-rich liquid core drives self-sustained dynamo action, generating Earth's magnetic field, which is strongest among all terrestrial planets of the solar system. Rock records show that this magnetic field has…
The timing of the Moon's formation is fundamental to understanding the early Earth-Moon system. Ages of lunar magma ocean (LMO) crystallization have long been regarded as a key proxy for that event. Yet returned lunar sample ages cluster…