The proposed Millennium Nucleus on young exoplanets and their moons (YEMS) addresses the dichotomy in the formation of giant planets through the development of a new method for detecting young exoplanets. It is led by Alice Zurlo (Director) and Lucas Cieza (PI) from AstroUDP, together with Sebastián Pérez (alternate Director) from the University of Santiago, Cecilia Hernandez (PI) from the University of Concepción, and Viviana Guzman (PI) from the University Catolica.
One of the major debates in astrophysics concerns the formation pathway of giant planets like Jupiter. Giant planets play a dominant role in the architecture of planetary systems, as they contain the majority of the mass and angular momentum. Two competing theories offer viable formation scenarios for gas giants: the core accretion model and the disk instability model. Under what conditions is one theory favored over the other? And are these theories mutually exclusive? Answering these questions requires knowledge of where and when exoplanets form.
The birthplaces of planets are now within reach of modern observations, especially with large interferometric arrays and extreme adaptive optics cameras. These pioneering observations are revealing the physical processes occurring in protoplanetary disks that shape the architecture of future planetary systems, shedding light on the origin of our own Solar System. Discoveries of young exoplanets embedded in protoplanetary disks are beginning to uncover the intricate and potentially chaotic process of planet formation. We are now faced with the need to confirm and characterize young exoplanets in the process of formation. This requires advances in observations, simulations, and imaging techniques that we are only beginning to develop.
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