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Eric Mamajek |
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The nearest, youngest stars are the best targets for studying the early evolution of planetary systems at the highest spatial resolution and best sensitivity with modern observatories. In a sense, they provide us with our nearest snapshots of what our early solar system may have resembled. I will describe recent efforts to find and characterize the nearest, youngest stars in the Sun's vicinity, and what recent surveys of protoplanetary disks, dusty debris disks, and searches for giant planets at large orbital radii appear to be telling us about the planet formation process. I will also discuss some new predicted phenomena associated with planet formation which may be discovered with the next generation of telescopes and instruments, namely protoplanet collision afterglows and eclipses by primordial circumplanetary moon-forming disks. |