Understanding the Radius Valley as a by-product of Planet Formation: Observational Signatures of the Core-Powered Mass-Loss Mechanism
Akash Gupta - University of California, Los AngelesDec 22, 2020
Formation & evolution
Planet interiors
Atmospheric theory
Atmospheric escape
Super-Earths
Sub-Neptunes
Radius valley
Radius gap
Planet evolution
Atmospheres
Planet-star interactions
Core-powered mass-loss
Exoplanets 3
Talk presented at the Exoplanets III (2020) conference.
Overview: Observations have revealed a lack of planets of sizes ~1.5-2.0 Earth radii, i.e. a radius ‘valley’ in the size distribution of small, short-period exoplanets. Typically, this observation has been attributed to atmospheric mass-loss due to photoevaporation. However, in recent work, Ginzburg et ...