Pluto and Charon: A case of precession‐orbit resonance?

Rubincam, David Parry

doi:10.1029/2000je001273

Cited by 7 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 18 publications

(16 reference statements)

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“…We do note, however, that it remains to be studied whether a Kozai mechanism, eccentricity resonances (e.g., perhaps related to the inclination resonance effects discussed by Rubincam [2000]), or a strong libration of Pluto coupled to a significant Plutonian J 2 could drive a sufficiently large equilibrium eccentricity.…”

Section: What Then Of Charon's Reported Eccentricity?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Regarding the Putative Eccentricity of Charon's Orbit

Stern¹,

Bottke²,

Levison³

2003

The Astronomical Journal

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Based on astrometry from an orbit derived by Hubble Space Telescope imagery, Charon's orbital eccentricity has been reported to be in the range of 0.003-0.008. Solar and planetary tides are orders of magnitude too small to induce the reported eccentricity. This nonzero value, if correct, therefore indicates some significant forcing against the two-body tidal equilibrium value, which should formally be zero. Here we follow up on a preliminary study to investigate whether the reported eccentricity of Charon's orbit could be due to gravitational perturbations by Kuiper belt object (KBO) flybys through the Pluto-Charon system and KBO impacts directly onto Pluto and Charon. We find it is unlikely that Charon's reported eccentricity could be caused by this effect. Although we cannot rule out some additional source of eccentricity excitation (e.g., an undiscovered satellite in the system, or a Kozai resonance), our analysis indicates it is plausible that Charon's actual orbital eccentricity is substantially smaller than the 0.003 lower limit reported previously.

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Section: What Then Of Charon's Reported Eccentricity?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Regarding the Putative Eccentricity of Charon's Orbit

Stern¹,

Bottke²,

Levison³

2003

The Astronomical Journal

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“…Sometimes, however, additional effects, such central-body oblateness (Murray and Dermott, 1999, p. 264-270) or central-body precession (Rubincam, 2000), can play a crucial role in the system evolution. Further, in the formation stages of a planetary or satellite system, a disk may be present.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Kozai (1960) conducted one of the first studies of how a satellite's orbital elements are affected by the precession of its parent planet. Kinoshita (1993) studied the motion of a satellite relative to the equatorial plane of its oblate parent parent, and Rubincam (2000) discusses the possibility that Pluto may be in "precession-orbit" resonance. Expressions for the precession contribution to the disturbing function are given implicitly by Goldreich (1965b) and explicitly by Kopal (1969), Brumberg et al (1970) and Efroimsky (2005b); using their results, we can write:…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A resonant-term-based model including a nascent disk, precession, and oblateness: application to GJ 876

Veras

2007

Celestial Mech Dyn Astr

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Investigations of two resonant planets orbiting a star or two resonant satellites orbiting a planet often rely on a few resonant and secular terms in order to obtain a representative quantitative description of the system's dynamical evolution. We present a semianalytic model which traces the orbital evolution of any two resonant bodies in a first-through fourth-order eccentricity or inclination-based resonance dominated by the resonant and secular arguments of the user's choosing. By considering the variation of libration width with different orbital parameters, we identify regions of phase space which give rise to different resonant "depths," and propose methods to model libration profiles. We apply the model to the GJ 876 extrasolar planetary system, quantify the relative importance of the relevant resonant and secular contributions, and thereby assess the goodness of the common approximation of representing the system by just the presumably dominant terms. We highlight the danger in using "order" as the metric for accuracy in the orbital solution by revealing the unnatural libration centers produced by the second-order, but not first-order, solution, and by demonstrating that the true orbital solution lies somewhere "in-between" the third-and fourth-order solutions. We also present formulas used to incorporate perturbations from central-body oblateness and precession, and a protoplanetary or protosatellite thin disk with gaps, into a resonant system. We quantify the contributions of these perturbations into the GJ 876 system, and thereby highlight the conditions which must exist for multiplanet exosystems to be significantly influenced by such factors. We find that massive enough disks may convert resonant libration into circulation; such disk-induced signatures may provide constraints for future studies of exoplanet systems.

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“…Mass, radius, moment of inertia and equatorial rotation velocity for Solar System planets were drawn from [4]; missing more exact data, the upper bound value for Neptune's I z [4] and the average value across a range for Pluto's I z [5] were used.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…in Baurov and Malov [20]. Such summary potential cannot exceed, by magnitude, the modulus of the cosmological vectorial potential A g , a new fundamental constant having absolute value |A g | ≈ 1.9⋅10 5 T⋅m. As the result of the action of the field potentials (decreasing |A Σ |), each particle gains an energy ∆m⋅c 2 that corresponds to a new force of nature throwing substance out of the region with the weakened A Σ .…”

Section: At the Origin Of Planetary Rotationmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the Dependence of Planetary Spin on Mass

Meneguzzo

Albanese

2014

AJAA

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Abstract:The recent direct spectroscopic observation of the spin of the young gas giant exoplanet β Pictoris b was a powerful clue as to the general validity of the trend of the planetary spin with the mass even outside the Solar System. Nevertheless, the spin-mass relationship, which looks like to hold irrespective of the planet composition and radius, is admittedly poorly understood. On the basis of bilogarithmic regressions, the rotational kinetic energy is found to explain the available data more significantly than the equatorial rotation velocity but no more than the spin angular momentum; nevertheless, only the rotational energy turns out to be closely proportional to the square of the mass of planets, suggesting its possible close and direct ties to the planetary mass by means of some fundamental processes. The hypothesis is made that such underlying physical processes can be described by the non-gauge cosmological theory of byuons, which proved useful to explain other astrophysical and geophysical puzzling phenomena such as the motion of pulsars, the nature of dark matter and dark energy, the anisotropy of cosmic rays and the accelerated expansion of the Universe. It's shown that the theory of byuons is able to explain the observed close proportionality of the planetary rotational kinetic energy to the square of the mass.

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Pluto and Charon: A case of precession‐orbit resonance?

Cited by 7 publications

References 18 publications

Regarding the Putative Eccentricity of Charon's Orbit

Regarding the Putative Eccentricity of Charon's Orbit

A resonant-term-based model including a nascent disk, precession, and oblateness: application to GJ 876

On the Dependence of Planetary Spin on Mass

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