Alexander Seizinger

From 2010 to 2013 I have been a PhD student in the group of Wilhelm Kley. In January 2014 I finished my PhD (Dr. rer. nat.) with distinction. During my work I have developed and calibrated a molecular dynamics code that is capable of simulating the behaviour of porous dust/ice agglomerates.

Exploiting the massive parallel computing power provided by modern GPUs allows for the simulation of agglomerates composed of several hundred-thousands of particles within a reasonable ammount of time.

One aim of my simulations is to determine material properties such as compressive, tensile, or shear strength of porous dust agglomerates. I am also interested in the outcome of aggregate collisions to study the growth of micron sized dust grains to macroscopic bodies.

In collaboration with Andras Zsom I currently study the growth of micrometer sized dust aggregates in turbulent protoplanetary disks.

• Planet formation (especially the first growth phase)
• Molecular Dynamics
• Porous particle agglomerates
• GPU computing (CUDA)

• Andras Zsom, MIT
• Jürgen Blum & his group, TU Braunschweig
• Sebastiaan Krijt, Universiteit Leiden

My work is supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) grant KL 650/16. Some of the required computing power is provided by the bwGRID.

From 2005 to 2010 I have been a fellow of the German National Academic Foundation (Studienstifung des deutschen Volkes).