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Studying the habitability, internal structure and composition of exoplanets is crucial for understanding their potential to sustain life beyond our solar system. Characterizing planetary structures and atmospheric evolution provides…
In the core accretion paradigm of planet formation, gas giants only form a massive atmosphere after their progenitors exceeded a threshold mass: the critical core mass. Most (exo)planets, being smaller and rock/ice-dominated, never crossed…
Astrophysical observations reveal a large diversity of radii and masses of exoplanets. It is important to characterize the interiors of exoplanets to understand planetary diversity and further determine how unique, or not, Earth is.…
The oxidation of rocky planet surfaces and atmospheres, which arises from the twin forces of stellar nucleosynthesis and gravitational differentiation, is a universal process of key importance to habitability and exoplanet biosignature…
High-precision infrared spectroscopic measurements now enable detailed characterization of sub-Neptune atmospheres, potentially providing constraints on their interiors. Motivated by this, atmospheric models have been developed to explore…
The interest in the structure of ice-rich planetary bodies, in particular the differentiation between ice and rock, has grown due to the discovery of Kuiper belt objects and exoplanets. We thus carry out a parameter study for a range of…
To aid in the physical interpretation of planetary radii constrained through observations of transiting planets, or eventually direct detections, we compute model radii of pure hydrogen-helium, water, rock, and iron planets, along with…
Direct and statistical observational evidences suggest that photoevaporation is important in eroding the atmosphere of sub-Neptune planets. We construct full hydrodynamic simulations, coupled with consistent thermochemistry and ray-tracing…
The observed mass-radius relationship of low-mass planets informs our understanding of their composition and evolution. Recent discoveries of low mass, large radii objects ("super-puffs") have challenged theories of planet formation and…
The majority of the transiting planets discovered by the Kepler mission (called super-Earths here, includes the so-called 'sub-Neptunes') orbit close to their stars. As such, photoevaporation of their hydrogen envelopes etch sharp features…
Super-Earths orbiting M-dwarf stars may be the most common habitable planets in the Universe. However, their habitability is threatened by intense irradiation from their host stars, which drives the escape of water to space and can lead to…
Sub-Saturns straddle the boundary between gas-rich Jupiters and gas-poor super-Earths/sub-Neptunes. Their large radii (4--8$R_\oplus$) suggest that their gas-to-core mass ratios range $\sim$0.1--1.0. With their envelopes as massive as their…
Climate transitions on exoplanets offer valuable insights into the atmospheric processes governing planetary habitability. Previous pure-steam atmospheric models show a thermal limit in outgoing long-wave radiation, which has been used to…
Motivated by recent discoveries of low-density super-Earths with short orbital periods, we have investigated in-situ accretion of H-He atmospheres on rocky bodies embedded in dissipating warm disks, by simulating quasi-static evolution of…
Over the last decade, precise exoplanet transmission spectroscopy has revealed the atmospheres of dozens of exoplanets, driven largely by observatories like the Hubble Space Telescope. One major discovery has been the ubiquity of…
Kepler has found hundreds of Neptune-size (2-6 R_Earth) planet candidates within 0.5 AU of their stars. The nature of the vast majority of these planets is not known because their masses have not been measured. Using theoretical models of…
Low-mass low-density planets discovered by Kepler in the super-Earth mass regime typically have large radii for their inferred masses, implying the presence of H$_2$-He atmospheres. These planets are vulnerable to atmospheric mass loss due…
We investigate the deep water abundance of Neptune using a simple 2-component (core + envelope) toy model. The free parameters of the model are the total mass of heavy elements in the planet (Z), the mass fraction of Z in the envelope…
Super-Earths span a wide range of bulk densities, indicating a diversity in interior conditions beyond that seen in the solar system. In particular, an emerging population of low-density super-Earths may be explained by volatile-rich…
The ability of a planet to maintain surface water, key to life as we know it, depends on solar and planetary energy. As a star ages, it delivers more energy to a planet. As a planet ages it produces less internal heat, which leads to…