132 research outputs found
Capture Probability in the 3:1 Mean Motion Resonance with Jupiter
We study the capture and crossing probabilities into the 3:1 mean motion
resonance with Jupiter for a small asteroid that migrates from the inner to the
middle Main Belt under the action of the Yarkovsky effect. We use an algebraic
mapping of the averaged planar restricted three-body problem based on the
symplectic mapping of Hadjidemetriou (1993), adding the secular variations of
the orbit of Jupiter and non-symplectic terms to simulate the migration. We
found that, for fast migration rates, the captures occur at discrete windows of
initial eccentricities whose specific locations depend on the initial resonant
angles, indicating that the capture phenomenon is not probabilistic. For slow
migration rates, these windows become narrower and start to accumulate at low
eccentricities, generating a region of mutual overlap where the capture
probability tends to 100%, in agreement with the theoretical predictions for
the adiabatic regime. Our simulations allow to predict the capture
probabilities in both the adiabatic and non-adiabatic cases, in good agreement
with results of Gomes (1995) and Quillen (2006). We apply our model to the case
of the Vesta asteroid family in the same context as Roig et al. (2008), and
found results indicating that the high capture probability of Vesta family
members into the 3:1 mean motion resonance is basically governed by the
eccentricity of Jupiter and its secular variations
On the dynamics of Extrasolar Planetary Systems under dissipation. Migration of planets
We study the dynamics of planetary systems with two planets moving in the
same plane, when frictional forces act on the two planets, in addition to the
gravitational forces. The model of the general three-body problem is used.
Different laws of friction are considered. The topology of the phase space is
essential in understanding the evolution of the system. The topology is
determined by the families of stable and unstable periodic orbits, both
symmetric and non symmetric. It is along the stable families, or close to them,
that the planets migrate when dissipative forces act. At the critical points
where the stability along the family changes, there is a bifurcation of a new
family of stable periodic orbits and the migration process changes route and
follows the new stable family up to large eccentricities or to a chaotic
region. We consider both resonant and non resonant planetary systems. The 2/1,
3/1 and 3/2 resonances are studied. The migration to larger or smaller
eccentricities depends on the particular law of friction. Also, in some cases
the semimajor axes increase and in other cases they are stabilized. For
particular laws of friction and for special values of the parameters of the
frictional forces, it is possible to have partially stationary solutions, where
the eccentricities and the semimajor axes are fixed.Comment: Accepted in Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronom
Stable manifolds and homoclinic points near resonances in the restricted three-body problem
The restricted three-body problem describes the motion of a massless particle
under the influence of two primaries of masses and that circle
each other with period equal to . For small , a resonant periodic
motion of the massless particle in the rotating frame can be described by
relatively prime integers and , if its period around the heavier primary
is approximately , and by its approximate eccentricity . We give a
method for the formal development of the stable and unstable manifolds
associated with these resonant motions. We prove the validity of this formal
development and the existence of homoclinic points in the resonant region.
In the study of the Kirkwood gaps in the asteroid belt, the separatrices of
the averaged equations of the restricted three-body problem are commonly used
to derive analytical approximations to the boundaries of the resonances. We use
the unaveraged equations to find values of asteroid eccentricity below which
these approximations will not hold for the Kirkwood gaps with equal to
2/1, 7/3, 5/2, 3/1, and 4/1.
Another application is to the existence of asymmetric librations in the
exterior resonances. We give values of asteroid eccentricity below which
asymmetric librations will not exist for the 1/7, 1/6, 1/5, 1/4, 1/3, and 1/2
resonances for any however small. But if the eccentricity exceeds these
thresholds, asymmetric librations will exist for small enough in the
unaveraged restricted three-body problem
The mass-period distribution of close-in exoplanets
The lower limit to the distribution of orbital periods P for the current
population of close-in exoplanets shows a distinctive discontinuity located at
approximately one Jovian mass. Most smaller planets have orbital periods longer
than P~2.5 days, while higher masses are found down to P~1 day.
We analyze whether this observed mass-period distribution could be explained
in terms of the combined effects of stellar tides and the interactions of
planets with an inner cavity in the gaseous disk.
We performed a series of hydrodynamical simulations of the evolution of
single-planet systems in a gaseous disk with an inner cavity mimicking the
inner boundary of the disk. The subsequent tidal evolution is analyzed assuming
that orbital eccentricities are small and stellar tides are dominant.
We find that most of the close-in exoplanet population is consistent with an
inner edge of the protoplanetary disk being located at approximately P>2 days
for solar-type stars, in addition to orbital decay having been caused by
stellar tides with a specific tidal parameter on the order of Q'*=10^7. The
data is broadly consistent with planets more massive than one Jupiter mass
undergoing type II migration, crossing the gap, and finally halting at the
interior 2/1 mean-motion resonance with the disk edge. Smaller planets do not
open a gap in the disk and remain trapped in the cavity edge. CoRoT-7b appears
detached from the remaining exoplanet population, apparently requiring
additional evolutionary effects to explain its current mass and semimajor axis.Comment: 8 Pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in A&
Taxonomy of asteroid families among the Jupiter Trojans: Comparison between spectroscopic data and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey colors
We present a comparative analysis of the spectral slope and color
distributions of Jupiter Trojans, with particular attention to asteroid
families. We use a sample of data from the Moving Object Catalogue of the Sloan
Digital Sky Survey, together with spectra obtained from several surveys. A
first sample of 349 observations, corresponding to 250 Trojan asteroids, were
extracted from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and we also extracted from the
literature a second sample of 91 spectra, corresponding to 71 Trojans. The
spectral slopes were computed by means of a least-squares fit to a straight
line of the fluxes obtained from the Sloan observations in the first sample,
and of the rebinned spectra in the second sample. In both cases the reflectance
fluxes/spectra were renormalized to 1 at 6230 . We found that the
distribution of spectral slopes among Trojan asteroids shows a bimodality.
About 2/3 of the objects have reddish slopes compatible with D-type asteroids,
while the remaining bodies show less reddish colors compatible with the P-type
and C-type classifications. The members of asteroid families also show a
bimodal distribution with a very slight predominance of D-type asteroids, but
the background is clearly dominated by the D-types. The L4 and L5 swarms show
different distributions of spectral slopes, and bimodality is only observed in
L4. These differences can be attributed to the asteroid families since the
backgraound asteroids show the same slope distribtuions in both swarms. The
analysis of individual families indicates that the families in L5 are
taxonomically homogeneous, but in L4 they show a mixture of taxonomic types. We
discuss a few scenarios that might help to interpret these results.Comment: 20 pages, 15 figures, 2 table
Resonances of low orders in the planetary system of HD37124
The full set of published radial velocity data (52 measurements from Keck +
58 ones from ELODIE + 17 ones from CORALIE) for the star HD37124 is analysed.
Two families of dynamically stable high-eccentricity orbital solutions for the
planetary system are found. In the first one, the outer planets c and d are
trapped in the 2/1 mean-motion resonance. The second family of solutions
corresponds to the 5/2 mean-motion resonance between these planets. In both
families, the planets are locked in (or close to) an apsidal corotation
resonance. In the case of the 2/1 MMR, it is an asymmetric apsidal corotation
(with the difference between the longitudes of periastra ), whereas in the case of the 5/2 MMR it is a symmetric antialigned
one ().
It remains also possible that the two outer planets are not trapped in an
orbital resonance. Then their orbital eccentricities should be relatively small
(less than, say, 0.15) and the ratio of their orbital periods is unlikely to
exceed .Comment: 28 pages, 10 figures, 3 tables; Accepted to Celestial Mechanics and
Dynamical Astronom
A Peculiar Family of Jupiter Trojans: the Eurybates
The Eurybates family is a compact core inside the Menelaus clan, located in
the L4 swarm of Jupiter Trojans. Fornasier et al. (2007) found that this family
exhibits a peculiar abundance of spectrally flat objects, similar to
Chiron-like Centaurs and C-type main belt asteroids. On the basis of the
visible spectra available in literature, Eurybates family's members seemed to
be good candidates for having on their surfaces water/water ice or aqueous
altered materials. To improve our knowledge of the surface composition of this
peculiar family, we carried out an observational campaign at the Telescopio
Nazionale Galileo (TNG), obtaining near-infrared spectra of 7 members. Our data
show a surprisingly absence of any spectral feature referable to the presence
of water, ices or aqueous altered materials on the surface of the observed
objects. Models of the surface composition are attempted, evidencing that
amorphous carbon seems to dominate the surface composition of the observed
bodies and some amount of silicates (olivine) could be present.Comment: 23 pages, 2 figures, paper accepted for publication in Icaru
Orbital structure of the GJ876 extrasolar planetary system, based on the latest Keck and HARPS radial velocity data
We use full available array of radial velocity data, including recently
published HARPS and Keck observatory sets, to characterize the orbital
configuration of the planetary system orbiting GJ876. First, we propose and
describe in detail a fast method to fit perturbed orbital configuration, based
on the integration of the sensitivity equations inferred by the equations of
the original -body problem. Further, we find that it is unsatisfactory to
treat the available radial velocity data for GJ876 in the traditional white
noise model, because the actual noise appears autocorrelated (and demonstrates
non-white frequency spectrum). The time scale of this correlation is about a
few days, and the contribution of the correlated noise is about 2 m/s (i.e.,
similar to the level of internal errors in the Keck data). We propose a
variation of the maximum-likelihood algorithm to estimate the orbital
configuration of the system, taking into account the red noise effects. We
show, in particular, that the non-zero orbital eccentricity of the innermost
planet \emph{d}, obtained in previous studies, is likely a result of
misinterpreted red noise in the data. In addition to offsets in some orbital
parameters, the red noise also makes the fit uncertainties systematically
underestimated (while they are treated in the traditional white noise model).
Also, we show that the orbital eccentricity of the outermost planet is actually
ill-determined, although bounded by . Finally, we investigate
possible orbital non-coplanarity of the system, and limit the mutual
inclination between the planets \emph{b} and \emph{c} orbits by
, depending on the angular position of the mutual orbital
nodes.Comment: 36 pages, 11 figures, 3 tables; Accepted to Celestial Mechanics and
Dynamical Astronom
A new analysis of the GJ581 extrasolar planetary system
We have done a new analysis of the available observations for the GJ581
exoplanetary system. Today this system is controversial due to choices that can
be done in the orbital determination. The main ones are the ocurrence of
aliases and the additional bodies - the planets f and g - announced in Vogt et
al. 2010. Any dynamical study of exoplanets requires the good knowledge of the
orbital elements and the investigations involving the planet g are particularly
interesting, since this body would lie in the Habitable Zone (HZ) of the star
GJ581. This region,for this system, is very attractive of the dynamical point
of view due to several resonances of two and three bodies present there. In
this work, we investigate the conditions under which the planet g may exist. We
stress the fact that the planet g is intimately related with the orbital
elements of the planet d; more precisely, we conclude that it is not possible
to disconnect its existence from the determination of the eccentricity of the
planet d. Concerning the planet f, we have found one solution with period
days, but we are judicious about any affirmation concernig this
body because its signal is in the threshold of detection and the high period is
in a spectral region where the ocorruence of aliases is very common. Besides,
we outline some dynamical features of the habitable zone with the dynamical map
and point out the role played by some resonances laying there.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figure
The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XIX. Characterization and dynamics of the GJ876 planetary system
Precise radial-velocity measurements for data acquired with the HARPS
spectrograph infer that three planets orbit the M4 dwarf star GJ876. In
particular, we confirm the existence of planet "d", which orbits every 1.93785
days. We find that its orbit may have significant eccentricity (e=0.14), and
deduce a more accurate estimate of its minimum mass of 6.3 Earth masses.
Dynamical modeling of the HARPS measurements combined with literature
velocities from the Keck Observatory strongly constrain the orbital
inclinations of the "b" and "c" planets. We find that i_b = 48.9 degrees and
i_c = 48.1 degrees, which infers the true planet masses of M_b = 2.64 Jupiter
masses and M_c = 0.83 Jupiter masses, respectively. Radial velocities alone, in
this favorable case, can therefore fully determine the orbital architecture of
a multi-planet system, without the input from astrometry or transits.
The orbits of the two giant planets are nearly coplanar, and their 2:1 mean
motion resonance ensures stability over at least 5 Gyr. The libration amplitude
is smaller than 2 degrees, suggesting that it was damped by some dissipative
process during planet formation. The system has space for a stable fourth
planet in a 4:1 mean motion resonance with planet "b", with a period around 15
days. The radial velocity measurements constrain the mass of this possible
additional planet to be at most that of the Earth.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy &
Astrophysic
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