Related papers: The obliquity of Enceladus
We investigate the chemical interaction between Saturn's corotating plasma and Enceladus' volcanic plumes. We evolve plasma as it passes through a prescribed H2O plume using a physical chemistry model adapted for water-group reactions. The…
Of the fourteen transiting extrasolar planetary systems for which radii have been measured, at least three appear to be considerably larger than theoretical estimates suggest. It has been proposed by Bodenheimer, Lin & Mardling that…
The equilibrium figure of an inviscid tidally deformed body is the starting point for the construction of many tidal theories such as Darwinian tidal theories or the hydrodynamical Creep tide theory. This paper presents the ellipsoidal…
Tidal interaction governs the redistribution of angular momentum in close binary stars and planetary systems and determines the systems evolution towards the possible equilibrium state. Turbulent friction acting on the equilibrium tide in…
Globally ice-covered oceans have been found on multiple moons in the solar system and may also have been a feature of Earth's past. However, relatively little is understood about the dynamics of these ice-covered oceans, which affect not…
While the Solar System contains no planets between the sizes of Uranus and Saturn, our current exoplanet census includes several dozen such planets with well-measured masses and radii. These sub-Saturns exhibit a diversity of bulk…
Odd viscous liquids are endowed with an intrinsic mechanism that tends to restore a displaced particle back to its original position. Since the odd viscous stress does not dissipate energy, inertial oscillations and inertial-like waves can…
Recently there has been tremendous increase in the number of identified extra-solar planetary systems. Our understanding of their formation is tied to exoplanet internal structure models, which rely upon equations of state of light elements…
The Cassini Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph (UVIS) observed a plume of water vapor spewing out from the south polar regions of Enceladus in occultation geometry 7 times during the Cassini mission. Five of them yielded data resolved…
Tidal interactions influence the orbital motions of binary star systems and extrasolar planets alike. Tides also affect stellar and planetary rotation rates. We demonstrate that in addition to altering spin synchronization and…
Since 1995, more than 500 extrasolar planets have been discovered orbiting very close to their parent star, where they experience strong tidal interactions. Their orbital evolution depends on the physical mechanisms that cause tidal…
Giant collisions can account for Uranus's and Neptune's large obliquities, yet generating two planets with widely different tilts and strikingly similar spin rates is a low-probability event. Trapping into a secular spin-orbit resonance, a…
Earth's fast rotation imposes the Taylor-Proudman Constraint that opposes fluid motion across an imaginary cylindrical surface called the Tangent Cylinder (TC) obtained by extruding the equatorial perimeter of the solid inner core along the…
New Horizons mission observations show that the small satellites Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra, of the Pluto-Charon system, have not tidally spun-down to near synchronous spin states and have high obliquities with respect to their orbit…
Tidal dissipation due to convective turbulent viscosity shapes the evolution of a variety of astrophysical binaries. For example, this type of dissipation determines the rate of orbital circularization in a binary with a post-main sequence…
The accurate determination of Saturn's gravitational coefficients by Cassini could provide tighter constrains on Saturn's internal structure. Also, occultation measurements provide important information on the planetary shape which is often…
Saturn's moon Iapetus has an orbit in a transition region where the Laplace surface is bending from the equator to the orbital plane of Saturn. The orbital inclination of Iapetus to the local Laplace plane is ~8 deg, which is unexpected,…
We investigate how obliquity affects stratospheric humidity using a 3D general circulation model and find the stratosphere under high obliquity could be over 3 orders of magnitude moister than under the low obliquity equivalent, even with…
The nonlinear coupling between stellar convection and rotation is of great interest because it relates to understanding both stellar evolution and activity. We investigated the influence of rotation and the Coriolis force on the dynamics…
Our knowledge of Saturns neutral thermosphere is far superior to that of the other giant planets due to Cassini Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph (UVIS) observations of 15 solar occultations and 26 stellar occultations analyzed to date.…