| The Causes and Consequences of Chaos and Instability in Planetary Systems |
| Sam Hadden, Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics |
| Event Type: Astro Seminar |
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| Time: 2:00 PM - 3:15 PM |
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| Location: 726 Broadway, 940, CCPP Seminar |
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| Abstract: Orbital instabilities play an important role in setting the final orbital architectures of planetary systems. In our own solar system, the terrestrial planets completed their assembly in a phase of giant impacts precipitated by instabilities and compelling formation models for the outer solar system explain its present-day configuration by invoking an instability that occurred shortly after the dispersal of the protoplanetary disk. There is also strong evidence that orbital instabilities play an important role in exoplanetary systems, from the production of hot Jupiters and free-floating planets to sculpting of the compact systems of sub-Neptunes found ubiquitously around sun-like stars. Instabilities in planetary systems are fundamentally a consequence of their chaotic dynamical evolution. I will describe recent progress on understanding the causes of orbital instabilities in planetary systems that has come from applications of the theory of non-linear dynamics and Hamiltonian chaos Link to the Event Video |