Related papers: Boulders on asteroid Toutatis as observed by Chang…
Asteroid pairs had a single progenitor that split due to rotational-fission of a weak, rubble-pile structured body. By constructing shape models of asteroid pairs from multiple-apparition observations and using a lightcurve inversion…
Many small boulders with reflectance values higher than 1.5 times the average reflectance have been found on the near-Earth asteroid 162173 Ryugu. Based on their visible wavelength spectral differences, Tatsumi et al. (2021) defined two…
Mountain ranges, volcanoes, trenches, and craters are common on rocky bodies throughout the Solar System, and we might we expect the same for rocky exoplanets. With ever larger telescopes under design and a growing need to not just detect…
High resolution simulations are used to map out the detailed structure of two long-lived stable belts of asteroid orbits in the inner Solar system. The Vulcanoid belt extends from 0.09 to 0.20 astronomical units (au), though with a gaps at…
The near-Earth asteroid (162173) Ryugu displays a Cb-type average spectrum and a very low average normal albedo of 0.04. Although the majority of boulders on Ryugu have reflectance spectra and albedo similar to the Ryugu average, a small…
Young asteroid families are unique sources of information about fragmentation physics and the structure of their parent bodies, since their physical properties have not changed much since their birth. Families have different properties such…
A class of asteroids, called large super-fast rotators (large SFRs), have rotation periods shorter than 2 hours and diameters larger than ~ 0.3 km. They pose challenges to the usual interior rubble-pile structure unless a relatively high…
The rotational distribution of asteroids as a function of their size is used {as a diagnostic of} their physical properties and evolution. Recent photometric surveys from the Gaia mission, allowing observation of asteroids with long spin…
The dust disks observed around mature stars are evidence that plantesimals are present in these systems on spatial scales that are similar to that of the asteroids and the KBOs in the Solar System. These dust disks (a.k.a. ``debris disks'')…
Giant planet migration appears widespread among planetary systems in our Galaxy. However, the timescales of this process, which reflect the underlying dynamical mechanisms, are not well constrained, even within the solar system. Since…
The small ($\le$ 135 km mean radius) saturnian satellites are closely related to the rings and together they constitute a complex dynamical system where formation and destruction mechanisms compete against each other. We model the cratering…
Tidal dissipation in a celestial body can be used to probe its internal structure. Tides govern the orbital evolution of binary systems and therefore constraints on the interior of binary system members can be derived by knowing the age and…
The Oort cloud is usually thought of as a collection of icy comets inhabiting the outer reaches of the Solar system, but this picture is incomplete. We use simulations of the formation of the Oort cloud to show that ~4% of the small bodies…
Asteroids and other Small Solar System Bodies (SSSBs) are of high general and scientific interest in many aspects. The origin, formation, and evolution of our Solar System (and other planetary systems) can be better understood by analysing…
Fifteen orbital clusters (associations) were identified among ~20000 near Earth asteroids (NEAs). All associations were found with a high statistical reliability using a single linkage cluster analysis algorithm and three orbital similarity…
By using recent observations of the Dydimos-Dimorphos system from the Hubble Space Telescope, 37 boulders with a size of 4 to 7 meters ejected from the system during the impact with the DART spacecraft were identified. In this work, we…
Asteroid 1934 CT;1989 AC, well known as 4179 Toutatis, is an Apollo and Mars-crosser asteroid with a chaotic orbit produced by a 3:1 resonance with Jupiter and a 1:4 resonance with the Earth, and frequent close approaches to the Earth. It…
Satellites of asteroids have been discovered in nearly every known small body population, and a remarkable aspect of the known satellites is the diversity of their properties. They tell a story of vast differences in formation and evolution…
Asteroid 162173 Ryugu has numerous craters. The initial measurement of impact craters on Ryugu, by Sugita et al. (2019), is based on Hayabusa2 ONC images obtained during the first month after the arrival of Hayabusa2 in June 2018. Utilizing…
Small high-speed impact craters formed in rocks, ice, and other brittle materials consist of an outer, broad shallow concentric region formed by tensile fracture (spall), surrounding a smaller central "pit" crater of greater depth. On the…