| Details: |
Since the discovery of the first extrasolar planet orbiting a Sun-like star
51 Peg in 1995,
over a thousand exoplanets have been confirmed. Several thousands of
additional planet
"candidates" are known with high chance of being confirmed. These
observations over
the past two decades have revolutionized our understanding of how planets
form and
evolve. These planets can have properties vastly different from those in
the Solar system
requiring modern theories to explain them. In my talk I will describe the
different
planet detection methods. I will then talk about a handful of surprising
exoplanet
populations, and discuss possible formation scenarios for these complex
systems. |