PhD Astronomy- Planet Formation and Evolution

Queen Mary University of London

In the last 15 years over 4000 planets have been discovered around stars other than the Sun. We are now moving beyond just detecting planets, to really understanding their properties and characterising them. It is now clear that planets have very diverse features and to explain this we have to learn how they are formed from flattened "protoplanetary discs’’ of material around young stars, as well as how the planets subsequently evolve. Of course, we ultimately want to understand our own Solar system, and how it fits into the spectrum of planetary architectures.We also have an extremely strong planet formation theory group, working on problems of planet-disc interaction, gravitational stability of discs, N-nody planet formation models and the influence of star forming environment on planet formation. We use magnetohydrodynamic and radiation hydrodynamic simulations on UK and European supercomputing facilities.

Physical and Chemical Sciences