Related papers: Identifying Interstellar Objects Trapped in the So…
I show that a dedicated space telescope with a meter-size aperture can detect numerous interstellar objects, 10-m in diameter, that pass within ~20 degrees from the Sun. Separating the emitted thermal radiation from the reflection of…
Interstellar Objects are comets and asteroids that formed around other stars but were ejected before they could accrete into exoplanets. They therefore represent a rare opportunity to compare the building blocks of planets in the Solar…
The Centaur (10199) Chariklo has the first rings system discovered around a small object. It was first observed using stellar occultation in 2013. Stellar occultations allow the determination of sizes and shapes with kilometre accuracy and…
Here, we explore some peculiar orbital features of the recently discovered asteroid A/2017 U1, which is a clear outlier when considering the average value of the eccentricity of known hyperbolic comets. As for the orientation of its orbit…
We use seven year's worth of observations from the Catalina Sky Survey and the Siding Spring Survey covering most of the northern and southern hemisphere at galactic latitudes higher than 20 degrees to search for serendipitously imaged…
A 2000-2017 set of long-period comets with high-quality orbits of perihelion distance <1 AU is used to show that the objects that perish shortly before perihelion are nearly exclusively the Oort Cloud comets, especially those with perihelia…
The Oort cloud is presumably a pristine relic of the Solar System formation. Detection of the Oort cloud may provide information regarding the stellar environment in which the Sun was born and on the planetesimal population during the outer…
Long-baseline interferometry at optical and near-infrared wavelengths is an emerging technology which is quickly becoming a useful tool to investigate stellar atmospheres and to compare observations with models. Stellar atmosphere models…
The recent discovery of an earth-like planet around Proxima Centauri has drawn much attention to this star and its environment. We performed a series of observations of Proxima Centauri using SPHERE, the planet finder instrument installed…
The Oort cloud, a collection of icy bodies orbiting the sun at roughly $10^{3}$ AU to $10^{5}$ AU, is believed to be the source of the long-period comets observed in the inner solar system. Although its existence was predicted nearly 70…
Aims. We address the problem of young stellar objects that are found too far away from possible star formation sites. Different mechanisms have been proposed before to explain this unexpected circumstance. The idea of high-velocity…
We present an analysis of surveying the inner Solar System for objects that may pose some threat to the Earth. Most of the analysis is based on understanding the capability provided by Sentinel, a concept for an infrared space-based…
The origin of the interstellar object 1I/'Oumuamua has defied explanation. We perform calculations of the non-gravitational acceleration that would be experienced by bodies composed of a range of different ices and demonstrate that a body…
The Centaur (60558) Echeclus was discovered on March 03, 2000, orbiting between the orbits of Jupiter and Uranus. After exhibiting frequent outbursts, it also received a comet designation, 174P. If the ejected material can be a source of…
The size distribution and total mass of objects in the Oort Cloud have important implications to the theory of planets formation, including the properties of, and the processes taking place in the early solar system. We discuss the…
Detecting heat from minor planets in the outer solar system is challenging, yet it is the most efficient means for constraining the albedos and sizes of Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) and their progeny, the Centaur objects. These physical…
Solar system object P/2010 A2 is the first-noticed example of the aftermath of a recently disrupted asteroid, probably resulting from a collision. Nearly a year elapsed between its inferred initiation in early 2009 and its eventual…
Given the considerable percentage of stars that are members of binaries or stellar multiples in the Solar neighborhood, it is expected that many of these binaries host planets, possibly even habitable ones. The discovery of a terrestrial…
A body in Solar orbit beyond the Kuiper belt exhibits an annual parallax that exceeds its apparent proper motion by up to many orders of magnitude. Apparent motion of this body along the parallactic ellipse will deflect the angular position…
The unexpected finding of a ring system around the Centaur (10199) Chariklo opened a new window for dynamical studies and posed many questions about the formation and evolutionary mechanisms of Centaurs as well as the relationship to…