Reseach

My research interests during the last 5 years have been focused on the study of different aspects of the debris disk phenomena, including:
Modeling of Debris Disk Structure:
The modeling of debris disk structure is a potential planet detection technique sensitive to long-period planets. The gravitational perturbations of a planet on the dust-producing planetesimals and/or on the dust particles themseleves can produce structure on the debris disk. If the disk is radiatively-dominated, < 0.001M(Earth), as is the case of the Kuiper Belt dust disk, the the disk structure is created because the dust grains migrate inward due to the effect of Poynting-Robertson drag, eventually coming in resonance with the planet and/or crossing its orbit (with the latter likely resulting in gravitational ejection from the system). If the disk is collisionally-dominated, > 0.001M(Earth), the collisional lifetime of the dust grains is short, and therefore, the grains may not survive long enough to come into resonance with an inner planet. However, the structure of the Kuiper Belt Objects gives strong evidence that Neptune migrated outward. This process may have also taken place in other planetary systems, where the outward migration of a planet could have scattered planetesimals out of the system or trapped them into Plutino-like orbits. Because the larger dust particles trace the location of the parent bodies, this outward migration can strongly affect the debris disk structure.
Solar System Kuiper Belt Dust:
The dust produced in the Kuiper Belt region extends throughout the Solar System due to Poynting-Robertson drag, forming a dust disk of wide radial extend. Some of its properties resemble those of extra-solar debris disks, and as such its study can help us understand the types of processes which might be at play in other planetary systems. The study of the Kuiper Belt dust is also important for the study of the small population of (undetected) Kuiper Belt Objects, for understanding the dynamical evolution of the Solar System, and for estimating a potential source of foreground contamination for cosmological observations.
Observations of Debris Disks with Spitzer:
Spitzer is carrying out spectrophotometric observations of hundreds of circumstellar disks most of which are spatially unresolved. The study of the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of the disks can help us diagnose the radial distribution of dust, allowing us to identify targets where the dynamical imprints of embedded giant planets may be present. This is one of the goals of the Spitzer Legacy Program "Formation and Evolution of Planetary Systems" (FEPS) .
Ejection of Debris from Planetary Systems:
Gravitational scattering by massive planets is very efficient at ejecting dust particles from a planetary system. This can result in a dust depleted region inside the orbit of the planet, may be explaining some of the inner cavities seen in spatially-resolved images of debris disks (or inferred from their SEDs). The ejection of debris can also have interesting astrobiological implications, as debris may be trasferred among planetary systems through low velocity chaotic orbits.

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