Origin of Chaos in the Prometheus-Pandora System
Astrophysics
2015-06-24 v1
Abstract
We demonstrate that the chaotic orbits of Prometheus and Pandora are due to interactions associated with the 121:118 mean motion resonance. Differential precession splits this resonance into a quartet of components equally spaced in frequency. Libration widths of the individual components exceed the splitting resulting in resonance overlap which causes the chaos. A single degree of freedom model captures the essential features of the chaotic dynamics. Mean motions of Prometheus and Pandora wander chaotically in zones of width 1.8 deg/yr and 3.1 deg/yr, respectively.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0307259,
title = {Origin of Chaos in the Prometheus-Pandora System},
author = {Peter Goldreich and Nicole Rappaport},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0307259},
year = {2015}
}