Related papers: Liquid Water Oceans in Ice Giants
Polyhydrides have been shown to form novel structures at high pressure, which may be found in the interiors of giant planets. With density functional molecular dynamics simulations we studied the behavior of ammonium polyhydride compounds…
Recent discoveries of water-rich, sub-Neptunian to Neptunian-massed exoplanets with short-period orbits present a new parameter space for the study of exoplanetary dynamos. We explore the geometry of the dynamo source region within this…
Liquids under confinement differ in behavior from their bulk counterparts and can acquire properties that are specific to the confined phase and linked to the nature and structure of the host matrix. While confined liquid water is not a new…
Planets with sizes between those of Earth and Neptune divide into two populations: purely rocky bodies whose atmospheres contribute negligibly to their sizes, and larger gas-enveloped planets possessing voluminous and optically thick…
Spectral observations of Neptune made in 2019 with the MUSE instrument at the Very Large Telescope in Chile have been analysed to determine the spatial variation of aerosol scattering properties and methane abundance in Neptune's…
Earth-like planets have anelastic mantles, whereas giant planets may have anelastic cores. As for the fluid parts of a body, the tidal dissipation of such solid regions, gravitationally perturbed by a companion body, highly depends on its…
Using ab initio simulations we investigate whether water ice is stable in the cores of giant planets, or whether it dissolves into the layer of metallic hydrogen above. By Gibbs free energy calculations we find that for pressures between 10…
Titan's abundant lakes and seas exchange methane vapor and energy with the atmosphere via a process generally known as air-sea interaction. This turbulent exchange process is investigated with an atmospheric mesoscale model coupled to a…
The chemistry of carbon in aqueous fluids at extreme pressure and temperature conditions is of great importance to Earth's deep carbon cycle, which substantially affects the carbon budget at Earth's surface and global climate change. At…
Observational breakthroughs in the exoplanet field of the last decade motivated the development of numerous theoretical models describing atmospheres and mass loss, which is believed to be one of the main drivers of planetary evolution. We…
We model the temperature and chemical structure of molecular clouds as a function of depth into the cloud, assuming a cloud of constant density n illuminated by an external FUV (6 eV < E < 13.6 eV) flux G_0 (scaling factor in multiples of…
Ice is a major component of astrophysical environment - from interstellar molecular clouds through protoplanetary disks to evolved solar systems. Ice and complex organic matter coexist in these environments as well, and it is thought…
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$0.1--1.0. With their envelopes as massive as their…
The presence of a liquid solvent is widely regarded as an essential prerequisite for habitability. We investigate the conditions under which worlds outside the habitable zones of stars are capable of supporting liquid solvents on their…
The mixing behavior of hydrogen with heavier elements plays a key role in modeling the interiors of giant planets such as Jupiter and Saturn. Using density functional theory combined with molecular dynamics, we investigate hydrogen-neon…
Two habitable planetary states are proposed: an aqua planet like the Earth and a land planet that has a small amount of water. Land planets keep liquid water under larger solar radiation compared to aqua planets. Water loss may change an…
The evolution and structure of sub-Neptunes may be strongly influenced by interactions between the outer gaseous envelope of the planet and a surface magma ocean. However, given the wide variety of permissible interior structures of these…
Among exoplanets, the small-size population constitutes the dominant one, with a diversity of properties and compositions ranging from rocky to gas dominated envelope. While a large fraction of them have masses and radii similar to or…
Tidal dissipation in planetary interiors is one of the key physical mechanisms that drive the evolution of star-planet and planet-moon systems. New constraints are now obtained both in the Solar and exoplanetary systems. Tidal dissipation…
Massive steam and CO$_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…