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Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences Friday Seminar
Friday, November 15, 2024 at 12:15 pm JILA Foothills Arcelia Ruiz , UC Santa Cruz "Constraining Migration Processes in the Outer Solar System and Planet-Disk Interactions in the AU Mic Debris Disk"  Abstract:Orbital distributions of the small bodies in debris disks (dust/planetesimal belts left over from planet formation) provide important information regarding the dynamical history of a planetary system. In our solar system, Transneptunian populations–particularly those in mean motion resonance with Neptune–hint towards an early chaotic planetary migration. In extrasolar systems, dust structure hints at the presence of undetected planets and various dynamical processes. It remains an open question if the planet architecture of a system is predestined from the initial star and protoplanetary disk or if the gravitational interactions between planets and planetesimals during the “teenage†years of a system are the determining factor. Motivated by this question, I will discuss work in constraining the evolution of the outer solar system and understanding planet-disk interactions in the AU Mic debris disk. First, I will present published and ongoing work in constraining the migration of the giant planets in our solar system due to planetesimal-driven migration and an upheaval such as the “Nice Model.†Recent well-characterized surveys made this work possible, providing a method to make strong statistical comparisons between Nbody simulations and observations. The upcoming Vera Rubin Observatory’s LSST will observe ~10 times more data for the outer solar system, making this an exciting time to be doing this work. Lastly, I will show how an inclined, eccentric planet perturbs dust from an exterior debris disk to create dust clouds ejected primarily from one side of the disk. My Nbody simulations produce similar structure as seen in the scattered light images of the AU Mic debris disk. This system provides a unique opportunity to observe time-evolving morphology at yearly timescales and predict the orbit of a currently hidden planet.
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