Dust evolution: going beyond the empirical

TL;DR

This paper discusses advancing dust evolution models in astrophysics by integrating laboratory data to better understand how dust properties change in response to environmental factors.

Contribution

It highlights recent laboratory astrophysics advances that improve modeling of dust property evolution and identifies key data needed for further progress.

Findings

Laboratory data have improved understanding of dust property changes.

Recent advances have helped refine dust evolution models.

Further laboratory measurements are essential for progress.

Abstract

A key element when modeling dust in any astrophysical environment is a self-consistent treatment of the evolution of the dust material properties (size distribution, chemical composition and structure) as they react to and adjust to the local radiation field intensity and hardness and to the gas density and dynamics. The best way to achieve this goal is to anchore as many model parameters as possible to laboratory data. In this paper, I present two examples to illustrate how outstanding questions in dust modeling have been/are being moved forward by recent advances in laboratory astrophysics and what laboratory data are still needed to further advance dust evolution models.