Related papers: Close encounters: How stellar flybys shape planet-…
The majority of stars form in a clustered environment. This has an impact on the evolution of surrounding protoplanetary discs (PPDs) due to either photoevaporation or tidal truncation. Consequently, the development of planets depends on…
The surroundings of massive protostars constitute an accretion disc which has numerically been shown to be subject to fragmentation and responsible for luminous accretion-driven outbursts. Moreover, it is suspected to produce close binary…
Bars in disky galaxies can be formed by interactions with other systems, including those of comparable mass. It has long been established that the effect of such interactions on galaxy morphology depends strongly on the orbital…
The past decade has seen a revolution in our understanding of protoplanetary disk evolution and planet formation in single star systems. However, the majority of solar-type stars form in binary systems, so the impact of binary companions on…
Planets are a natural byproduct of the stellar formation process, resulting from local aggregations of material within the disks surrounding young stars. Whereas signatures of gas-giant planets at large orbital separations have been…
Many theoretical studies have shown that external photoevaporation from massive stars can severely truncate, or destroy altogether, the gaseous protoplanetary discs around young stars. In tandem, several observational studies report a…
Young protostellar discs provide the initial conditions for planet formation. The properties of these discs may be different from those of late-phase (T Tauri) discs due to continuing infall from the envelope and protostellar variability…
Disc winds and planet formation are considered to be two of the most important mechanisms that drive the evolution and dispersal of protoplanetary discs and in turn define the environment in which planets form and evolve. While both have…
Most stars are born in dense stellar environments where the formation and early evolution of planetary systems may be significantly perturbed by encounters with neighbouring stars. To investigate on the fate of circumstellar gas disks and…
Simulations of the effects of stellar fly-bys on planetary systems in star-forming regions show a strong dependence on subtle variations in the initial spatial and kinematic substructure of the regions. For similar stellar densities, the…
We perform 3D hydrodynamics simulations of disc-disc stellar flybys with on-the-fly Monte Carlo radiative transfer. We show that pre-existing circumstellar discs around both stars result in fast rising ($\sim$yrs) outbursts lasting 2-5…
The architecture and evolution of planetary systems are shaped in part by stellar flybys. Within this context, we look at stellar encounters which are too weak to immediately destabilize a planetary system but are nevertheless strong enough…
Theory and observations suggest that star formation occurs hierarchically due to the fragmentation of giant molecular clouds. In this case we would expect substructure and enhanced stellar multiplicity in the primordial cluster. This…
Stellar fly-bys can have multiple dynamical effects on protoplanetary disks, including warping and the excitation of spiral arms. Since observations indicate that warps are common, we aim to investigate these effects for different fly-by…
The star formation process in molecular clouds usually leads to the formation of multiple stellar systems, mostly binaries. Remaining disks around those stars may be located around individual stars (circumstellar disks) or around the entire…
The recent detection of planets around very low mass stars raises the question of the formation, composition and potential habitability of these objects. We use planetary system formation models to infer the properties, in particular their…
Recent discoveries of strongly misaligned transiting exoplanets pose a challenge to the established planet formation theory which assumes planetary systems to form and evolve in isolation. However, the fact that the majority of stars…
Stellar encounters potentially affect the evolution of the protoplanetary discs in the Orion Nebula Cluster (ONC). However, the role of encounters in other cluster environments is less known. We investigate the effect of the…
The majority of stars are born in clustered environments. In these environments, close encounters between young stars with planet-forming disks are expected to occur frequently. However, direct evidence of such interactions remains rare.…
Although debris disks may be common in exoplanet systems, only a few systems are known in which debris disks and planets coexist. Planets and the surrounding stellar population can have a significant impact on debris disk evolution. Here we…