Context. Until recently, camera networks designed for monitoring fireballs worldwide were not fully automated, implying that in case of a meteorite fall, the recovery campaign was rarely immediate. This was an important limiting factor as the most fragile – hence precious – meteorites must be recovered rapidly to avoid their alteration. Aims. The Fireball Recovery and InterPlanetary Observation Network (FRIPON) scientific project was designed to overcome this limitation. This network comprises a fully automated camera and radio network deployed over a significant fraction of western Europe and a small fraction of Canada. As of today, it consists of 150 cameras and 25 European radio receivers and covers an area of about 1.5 × 106 km2. Methods. The FRIPON network, fully operational since 2018, has been monitoring meteoroid entries since 2016, thereby allowing the characterization of their dynamical and physical properties. In addition, the level of automation of the network makes it possible to trigger a meteorite recovery campaign only a few hours after it reaches the surface of the Earth. Recovery campaigns are only organized for meteorites with final masses estimated of at least 500 g, which is about one event per year in France. No recovery campaign is organized in the case of smaller final masses on the order of 50 to 100 g, which happens about three times a year; instead, the information is delivered to the local media so that it can reach the inhabitants living in the vicinity of the fall. Results. Nearly 4000 meteoroids have been detected so far and characterized by FRIPON. The distribution of their orbits appears to be bimodal, with a cometary population and a main belt population. Sporadic meteors amount to about 55% of all meteors. A first estimate of the absolute meteoroid flux (mag < –5; meteoroid size ≥~1 cm) amounts to 1250/yr/106 km2. This value is compatible with previous estimates. Finally, the first meteorite was recovered in Italy (Cavezzo, January 2020) thanks to the PRISMA network, a component of the FRIPON science project.

The problem of the attitude dynamics of a triaxial gyrostat under no external torques and one constant internal rotor, is a three degrees-of-freedom system, although thanks to the existence of integrals of motion it can be reduced to only one degree-of-freedom problem. We introduce coordinates to represent the orbits of constant angular momentum as a flow on a sphere. This representation shows that the problem is equivalent to a quadratic Hamiltonian depending on two parameters. We find the exact solution of the orbits in terms of elliptic functions. By making use of properties of elliptic functions we find the solution at each region of the parametric partition from the solution of one region. We also prove that heteroclinic orbits are planar curves.

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We investigate the classical dynamics of a hydrogen atom near a metallic surface in the presence of a uniform electric field. To describe the atom-surface interaction we use a simple electrostatic image model. Owing to the axial symmetry of the system, the z-component of the canonical angular momentum P is an integral and the electronic dynamics is modeled by a two degrees of freedom Hamiltonian in cylindrical coordinates. The structure and evolution of the phase space as a function of the electric field strength is explored extensively by means of numerical techniques of continuation of families of periodic orbits and Poincaré surfaces of section. We find that, due to the presence of the electric field, the atom is strongly polarized through two consecutive pitchfork bifurcations that strongly change the phase space structure. Finally, by means of the phase space transition state theory and the classical spectral theorem, the ionization dynamics of the atom is studied.

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We study the spin-up dynamics of a dual-spin spacecraft containing one axisymmetric rotor which is parallel to one of the principal axes of the spacecraft. It will be supposed that one of the moments of inertia of the platform is a periodic function of time and that the center of mass of the spacecraft is not modified. Under these assumptions, it is shown that in the absence of external torques and spinning rotors the system possesses chaotic behavior in the sense that it exhibits Smale's horseshoes. We prove this statement by means of the Melnikov method.The presence of chaotic behavior results in a random spin-up operation. This randomness is visualized by means of maps of the initial conditions with final nutation angle close to zero. This phenomenon is well described by a suitable parameter that measures the amount of randomness of the process. Finally, we relate this parameter with the Melnikov function in the absence of the spinning rotor and with the presence of subharmonic resonances.

The stability of the permanent rotations of a heavy gyrostat is analyzed by means of the Energy-Casimir method. Su cient and necessary conditions are established for some of the permanent rotations. The geometry of the gyrostat and the value of the gyrostatic moment are relevant in order to get stable permanent rotations. Moreover, the necessary conditions are also su cient, for some configurations of the gyrostat.