Related papers: Solar System: Sifting through the debris
Much remains to be understood about the nature of exoplanets smaller than Neptune, most of which have been discovered in compact multi-planet systems. With its inner ultra-short period planet b aligned with the star and two larger outer…
The dust measured in debris disks traces the position of planetesimal belts. In our Solar System, we are also able to measure the largest planetesimals directly and can extrapolate down to make an estimate of the dust. The zodiacal dust…
Following the discovery that asteroid (3753) Cruithne was a coorbital companion of the Earth, a new theory of coorbital motion has been developed whereby planets or satellites can maintain companion objects in the same orbit as themselves.…
The Nice model of Gomes et al. (2005) suggests that the migration of the giant planets caused a planetesimal clearing event which led to the Late Heavy Bombardment (LHB) at 880 Myr. Here we investigate the IR emission from the Kuiper belt…
The results of precise analysis of elements and isotopes in meteorites, comets, the Earth, the Moon, Mars, Jupiter, the solar wind, solar flares, and the solar photosphere since 1960 reveal fingerprints of a local supernova (SN), undiluted…
Debris disks are the dust disks found around ~20% of nearby main sequence stars in far-IR surveys. They can be considered as descendants of protoplanetary disks or components of planetary systems, providing valuable information on…
Scalar fields are crucial components in high energy physics and extensions of General Relativity. The fact they are not observed in the solar system may be due to a mechanism which screens their presence in high dense regions. We show how…
Meteoroids originating from the local interstellar medium, traverse the solar system. This has been proven by in situ measurements by interplanetary spacecraft as well as highly sensitive radar measurements. Early attempts to detect…
Important results achieved over the last years on supernova remnants, planetary nebulae and superbubbles are briefly reviewed in the context of X-ray observations. I intend to review the important open scientific questions in these fields,…
Debris belts on the periphery of planetary systems, encompassing the region occupied by planetary orbits, are massive analogues of the Solar system's Kuiper belt. They are detected by thermal emission of dust released in collisions amongst…
The recent discovery of a staggering diversity of planets beyond the Solar System has brought with it a greatly expanded search space for habitable worlds. The Kepler exoplanet survey has revealed that most planets in our interstellar…
To study the population properties of small, remote objects beyond Neptune's orbit in the outer solar system, of kilometer size or smaller, serendipitous occultation search is so far the only way. For hectometer-sized Trans-Neptunian…
The $Herschel$ Space telescope carried out an unprecedented survey of nearby stars for debris disks. The dust present in these debris disks scatters and polarizes stellar light in the visible part of the spectrum. We explore what can be…
The definition of nearby star systems is incomplete without an understanding of the dynamical interaction between the stars and ambient interstellar material. The Sun itself has been immersed in the Local Bubble interior void for millions…
For centuries, humanity wondered if there were other worlds like ours in the Universe. For about a quarter of a century, we have known that planetary systems exist around other stars, and more than 3800 exoplanetary systems have been…
The high precision of the latest version of the planetary ephemeris EPM2011 enables one to explore more accurately a variety of small effects in the solar system. The processing of about 678 thousand of position observations of planets and…
Numerical simulations suggest that Neptune primordial co-orbitals may outnumber the equivalent population hosted by Jupiter, yet the objects remain elusive. Since the first discovery in 2001 just 10 minor planets have been identified as…
Thousands of confirmed and candidate exoplanets have been identified in recent years. Consequently, theoretical research on the formation and dynamical evolution of planetary systems has seen a boost, and the processes of planet-planet…
Micron size extrasolar dust particles have been convincingly detected by satellites. Larger extrasolar meteoroids (5-35 microns) have most likely been detected by ground based radar at Arecibo and New Zealand. We present estimates of the…
A detailed study of comets active at large heliocentric distances (greater than 4 au) which enter the Solar System for the first time and are composed of matter in its elementary, unprocessed state, would help in our understanding of the…