Planetary Diversity Rocky Planet Processes and Their Observational Signatures

The last 30 years have seen an irrevocable change in the field of planetary science with the discovery of the first planets around stars other than our own Sun. While approximately 20 percent of the exoplanets we have discovered are close in size to the Earth, the similarity of their surface environment to our home world remains unknown. These conditions will be probed in the coming decade by instruments capable of observing the atmospheric and surface composition of rocky exoplanets. The signature we observe will be a complex combination of the planet's geological, chemical and physical processes.This book presents an exploration of the potential diversity of rocky planets through a quantitative study of how planetary processes change as properties deviate from the Earth. Changes in four specific properties are considered : the presence of a magnetic field, the production and loss of internal heat, planetary composition and volatile abundance.