Gaps, rings and holes in protoplanetary discs - signs of newborn planets?

Recent first images from the Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA) telescope in Chile and the Very Large Telescope (VLT) have provided a breathtaking snapshot of planets `caught in the act of formation' around young stars. This project aims to provide urgently needed theoretical interpretation to these and a flood of other recent observations of the `protoplanetary discs', using 3D simulations to understand how newborn planets can carve structures such as 'gaps' and 'holes' seen by telescopes. We aim to develop a novel algorithm, MULTIGRAIN, capable of simulating a mixture of gas and multiple types of solid particles, applicable in astronomy and engineering, together with world-first simulations of discs irradiated by a central star.