Invited Presentation

Extremely Normal Planet Formation: the long mm- and cm-wavelength view of externally irradiated disks

Author(s): Ryan Boyden (University of Virginia)

Presenter: Ryan Boyden (University of Virginia)

Planets form in protoplanetary disks around young stars, and the properties of emerging planetary systems depend intimately on the structure, composition, and evolution of protoplanetary disks. With the commissioning of high angular resolution radio interferometers like the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and Expanded Very Large Array (EVLA), we can now probe the bulk dust and gas reservoirs of disks that reside in the most common sites of star formation: massive stellar clusters. This talk will present an overview of key ALMA and EVLA programs that have characterized the demographics of disks in the nearest stellar clusters. These programs, together with previous imaging from the Hubble Space Telescope, point to a scenario in which the initial conditions of planet formation are shaped profoundly by the UV radiation environments of stellar clusters. Finally, this talk will conclude with a discussion on how the James Webb Space Telescope, ALMA’s new Band 1 receiver, and ALMA’s Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade—with their unprecedented combinations of sensitivity, angular resolution, and wavelength coverage—are poised to revolutionize our understanding of how planet formation proceeds in irradiated star-forming clusters.