Nano dust in space and astrophysics

Abstract

The theme of this focus meeting is related to the detection, characterization and modeling of nano particles — cosmic dust of sizes of roughly 1 to 100 nm — in space environments like the interstellar medium, planetary debris disks, the heliosphere, the vicinity of the Sun and planetary atmospheres, and the space near Earth. Discussions focus on nano dust that forms from condensations and collisions and from planetary objects, as well as its interactions with space plasmas like the solar and stellar winds, atmospheres and magnetospheres. A particular goal is to bring together space scientists, astronomers, astrophysicists, and laboratory experimentalists and combine their knowledge to reach cross fertilization of different disciplines.