Asteroid formation, orbital evolution and impact history on Earth

Asteroid impacts on Earth have played an important role for the evolution of our planet throughout geological history. Early on in the history of the Earth, the asteroids may have delivered water to the Earth. Asteroid impacts are suspected to have caused several periods of mass extinction and climate change since then. The goal of this project is to use state-of-the-art models of asteroid formation, including new estimates for the birth size distribution of asteroids, to estimate the collisional and orbital evolution of the asteroid belt.