Dr. Sumita Jayaraman Senior Scientist Planetary Science Institute sumita @psi.edu

Research Interests:

• Origin and Evolution of Interplanetary Dust
• Dust dynamics and planetary perturbations
• Planetary signatures in exo-Zodiacal disks
• Infrared data calibration and analyses

Dr. Jayaraman is interested in understanding the behavior of dust particles in the presence of planets, in our solar system and beyond. She is currently working on a long term Spitzer project to monitor the zodiacal cloud and the Earth Resonant Ring. Spitzer's trailing orbit traverses the Resonant Ring, a circumsolar ring of dust at 1AU, and her models predict an increase in the zodiacal background levels as Spitzer enters a dust enhancement within the ring structure.