The Infona portal uses cookies, i.e. strings of text saved by a browser on the user's device. The portal can access those files and use them to remember the user's data, such as their chosen settings (screen view, interface language, etc.), or their login data. By using the Infona portal the user accepts automatic saving and using this information for portal operation purposes. More information on the subject can be found in the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service. By closing this window the user confirms that they have read the information on cookie usage, and they accept the privacy policy and the way cookies are used by the portal. You can change the cookie settings in your browser.
We present Keplerian orbit solutions for the mutual orbits of 17 transneptunian binary systems (TNBs). For ten of them, the orbit had not previously been known: 60458 2000 CM 114 , 119979 2002 WC 19 , 160091 2000 OL 67 , 160256 2002 PD 149 , 469514 2003 QA 91 , 469705 ǂKá̦gára, 508788 2000 CQ 114 , 508869 2002 VT 130 , 1999 RT 214 , and 2002 XH 91 . Seven more are systems where the size, shape, and...
We report on our study of asteroidal breakups, i.e. fragmentations of targets, subsequent gravitational reaccumulation and formation of small asteroid families. We focused on parent bodies with diameters Dpb=10km. Simulations were performed with a smoothed-particle hydrodynamics (SPH) code combined with an efficient N-body integrator. We assumed various projectile sizes, impact velocities and impact...
An asteroid family forms as a result of a collision between an impactor and a parent body. The fragments with ejection speeds higher than the escape velocity from the parent body can escape its gravitational pull. The cloud of escaping debris can be identified by the proximity of orbits in proper element, or frequency, domains. Obtaining estimates of the original ejection speed can provide valuable...
Themis is an old and statistically robust asteroid family populating the outer main belt, and resulting from a catastrophic collision that took place 2.5 ± 1.0 Gyr ago. Within the old Themis family a young sub-family, Beagle, formed less than 10 Myr ago, has been identified.We present the results of a spectroscopic survey in the visible and near infrared range of 22 Themis and 8 Beagle families members...
Many asteroid families are identified and well characterized all over the main asteroid belt. Interestingly, however, none of them are older than 4Gyr. Many mechanisms have been proposed to disperse such old primordial asteroid families that presumably have existed, but only very few have really worked. Here we present a plausible mechanism for dispersing primordial asteroid families that is based...
Dawson and Murray-Clay (Dawson and Murray-Clay [2012]. Astrophys. J., 750, 43) pointed out that the inner part of the cold population in the Kuiper belt (that with semi major axis a<43.5AU) has orbital eccentricities significantly smaller than the limit imposed by stability constraints. Here, we confirm their result by looking at the orbital distribution and stability properties in proper element...
Using 8–10-m class telescopes and their Adaptive Optics (AO) systems, we conducted a long-term adaptive optics campaign initiated in 2003 focusing on four binary asteroid systems: (130) Elektra, (283) Emma, (379) Huenna, and (3749) Balam. The analysis of these data confirms the presence of their asteroidal satellite. We did not detect any additional satellite around these systems even though we have...
V-type asteroids are bodies whose surfaces are constituted of basalt. In the Main Asteroid Belt, most of these asteroids are assumed to come from the basaltic crust of Asteroid (4) Vesta. This idea is mainly supported by (i) the fact that almost all the known V-type asteroids are in the same region of the belt as (4) Vesta, i.e., the inner belt (semi-major axis 2.1<a<2.5 AU), (ii) the existence...
Asteroids have a wide range of rotation states. While the majority spin a few times to several times each day in principal axis rotation, a small number spin so slowly that they have somehow managed to enter into a tumbling rotation state. Here we investigate whether the Yarkovsky–Radzievskii–O'Keefe–Paddack (YORP) thermal radiation effect could have produced these unusual spin states. To do this,...
We have made near-IR spectral observations of the very young (5.75 Myr) S-type asteroid 832 Karin, well sampled in rotational phase over its 18.35-h period. We find no significant variations in its reflectance spectrum. Karin, the brightest member of the Karin cluster (a sub-family of the larger, older Koronis dynamical family), was shown to be exceptionally young by Nesvorný et al. [Nesvorný, D.,...
Understanding the evolution of asteroid spin states is challenging work, in part because asteroids have a variety of orbits, shapes, spin states, and collisional histories but also because they are strongly influenced by gravitational and non-gravitational (YORP) torques. Using efficient numerical models designed to investigate asteroid orbit and spin dynamics, we study here how several individual...
The Agnia asteroid family, a cluster of asteroids located near semimajor axis a=2.79 AU, has experienced significant dynamical evolution over its lifetime. The family, which was likely created by the breakup of a diameter D∼50 km parent body, is almost entirely contained within the high-order secular resonance z1. This means that unlike other families, Agnia's full extent in proper eccentricity and...
Asteroid families are the byproducts of catastrophic collisions whose fragments form clusters in proper semimajor axis, eccentricity, and inclination space. Although many families have been observed in the main asteroid belt, only two very young families, Karin and Veritas, have well-determined ages. The ages of other families are needed, however, if we hope to infer information about their ejection...
The Eos asteroid family is the third most populous, after Themis and Koronis, and one of the largest non-random groups of asteroids in the main belt. It has been known and studied for decades, but its structure and history still presented difficulties to understand. We first revise the Eos family identification as a statistical cluster in the space of proper elements. Using the most to-date catalogue...
In this paper, we show that Asteroid (433) Eros is currently residing in a spin–orbit resonance, with its spin axis undergoing a small-amplitude libration about the Cassini state 2 of the proper mode in the nonsingular orbital element sinI/2exp(ıΩ), where I the orbital inclination and Ω the longitude of the node. The period of this libration is ≃53.4 kyr. By excluding these libration wiggles, we find...
It is well known that asteroid families have steeper absolute magnitude (H) distributions for H < 12-13 values than the background population. Beyond this threshold, the shapes of the absolute magnitude distributions in the family/background populations are difficult to determine, primarily because both populations are not yet observationally complete. Using a recently generated catalog containing...
Asteroid families are groupings of minor planets identified by clustering in their proper orbital elements; these objects have spectral signatures consistent with an origin in the break-up of a common parent body. From the current values of proper semimajor axes a of family members one might hope to estimate the ejection velocities with which the fragments left the putative break-up event (assuming...
We investigate the possibility that fractions of the primordial populations at the triangular Lagrangian points of Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune have survived to the present and form (as yet unobserved) clusters of bodies coorbiting with these planets. Such leftovers would be analogs of the numerous objects (Trojans) leading and trailing the revolutions of Jupiter around the Sun. We focus on the dynamical...
Numerous studies in the past few years have analyzed possible effects of planetary migration on the small bodies of the Solar System (mainly asteroids and KBOs), with the double aim of explaining certain dynamical structures in these systems, as well as placing limits on the magnitude of the radial migration of the planets. Here we undertake a similar aim, only this time concentrating on the dynamical...
Asteroid families are believed to originate by catastrophic disruptions of large asteroids. They are nowadays identified as clusters in the proper orbital elements space. The proper elements are analytically defined as constants of motion of a suitably simplified dynamical system. Indeed, they are generally nearly constant on a 10 7 -10 8 -year time scale. Over longer time intervals,...
Set the date range to filter the displayed results. You can set a starting date, ending date or both. You can enter the dates manually or choose them from the calendar.