Fakultät für Physik und Astronomie
STEPHEN PHILLIPS hostreviews.co.uk / UNSPLASH

How Planetary Systems are Shaped by their Birthplace: Computer Modeling of Planetary Systems Embedded in Star Clusters

Katja Reichert , ARI

Young stars are almost exclusively found in groups, suggesting that most stars - and hence also most planets - form in stellar associations or clusters. Our Solar System is also thought to have formed in a clustered environment since isotopic ratios in meteorites indicate the occurrence of a supernova explosion close to the solar protoplanetary disk. Some star clusters dissolve within tens of millions of years but some also survive for hundreds of millions of years. In such environments, close stellar encounters are frequent, significantly affecting the dynamical architectures and stability of the planetary systems around those stars. We investigate how the initial orbital configuration of a planetary system affects its resilience against external perturbations due to other cluster members. By using a hybrid N-body code and current supercomputing hardware we simulate the dynamical evolution of planetary systems consisting of the four Solar System giant planets which orbit Sun-like stars in four different star cluster environments.

ARI Institute Colloquium
16 Jan 2020, 11:15
Astronomisches Rechen-Institut, Mönchhofstraße 12-14, Seminarraum 1

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