Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

I seek to create a comprehensive astronomical context for what makes our solar system habitable. I do so by searching for exoplanets, studying the atmospheres of brown dwarfs - planets' more massive kin - and by comparing the architectures of other planetary systems to that of our own. I seek to answer some of the most pressing questions in modern astrophysics: How can we detect extrasolar life? What is the diversity of planetary systems in the Milky Way galaxy? How does our own solar system fit in? I approach these questions from several directions, through innovation and advanced equipment. 1) I oversee two approved observing programs on NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and on NASA's Transit Exoplanet Survey Satellite to discover the first Earth-like habitable planets that could then be scrutinized for atmospheric biosignature gases. The innovative twist in seeking such exoplanets is to focus on low-mass host stars or brown dwarfs that are seen equator-on. The propensity of planetary systems to lie near the equatorial planes of their host stars, and the favourable contrast of habitable Earth-like planets around low-mass stars, makes such systems optimal for a future search for life: with the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (2021+). Ongoing work will further inform on the possibility of studying such exoplanets with dedicated small space telescopes. 2) Through collaborations with international teams using advanced high-contrast imaging instruments on the largest ground-based telescopes, and soon on the James Webb Space Telescope, I will continue to survey the diversity of dusty circumstellar "debris" disks: the signposts of exoplanetary systems. The observations from these programs will inform on the evolutionary states and architectures of exoplanetary systems. 3) I am embarking on a study of the solar system outskirts, using a novel fast-time domain implementation of the stellar occultation technique. This will for the first time reveal the expected vast population of kilometre-sized comets in the solar system Kuiper Belt. Analogous to the debris disks of other planetary systems, the Kuiper Belt carries an imprint of the dynamical history of our solar system. The Discovery award will allow me to support a multi-disciplinary research team at Western University, drawing on students and postdoctoral fellows in training at the Western-based Centre for Planetary and Space Exploration (CPSX). The environment at the CPSX is exceptionally well-suited for the proposed research, with substantial resources and renowned expertise in the related fields of planetary science, cosmochemistry, and astrobiology. My trainees will be involved in several of me international collaborations, and will interact on science projects with partners from both industry and the government research sector.