3rd M.S. VARDYA MEMORIAL LECTURE by Alessandro Morbidelli

The Diversity of Planetary Systems How singular is our own? by Alessandro Morbidelli Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur, France The discovery of a large number of extrasolar planets has demonstrated that our own system is not typical. Understanding the diversity of exoplanetary systems is a major goal of modern planetary science. The formation of planetary systems is not fully understood, but the last 20 years have seen major advances. We now know that accretion, migration, and dynamical evolution are coupled processes leading to complex pathways of planetary evolution and diverse planetary systems. In this talk we will uncover the processes that determined the basic structure of our solar system. We will also discuss how various coupled processes shape the structures of planetary systems in general.