Related papers: Dynamical Environment and Surface Characteristics …
Most meteorites are fragments from recent collisions experienced in the asteroid belt. In such a hyper-velocity collision, the smaller collision partner is destroyed, whereas a crater on the asteroid is formed or it is entirely disrupted,…
Dynamical models of Solar System evolution have suggested that P-/D-type volatile-rich asteroids formed in the outer Solar System and may be genetically related to the Jupiter Trojans, the comets and small KBOs. Indeed, their spectral…
An asteroid pair can be described as two asteroids with highly similar heliocentric orbits that are genetically related but not gravitationally bound. They can be produced by asteroid collisions or rotational fission. Although over 200…
The dynamical and physical properties of asteroid family members are widely used to reconstruct the collisional evolution of the main belt and of individual objects. Families offer insights into the properties of the parent bodies and the…
We performed a wide-field survey observation of small asteroids using the Hyper Suprime-Cam installed on the 8.2 m Subaru Telescope. We detected more than 3,000 main-belt asteroids with a detection limit of 24.2 mag in the r-band, which…
Asteroid families are groups of minor bodies produced by high-velocity collisions. After the initial dispersions of the parent bodies fragments, their orbits evolve because of several gravitational and non-gravitational effects,such as…
Ascertaining rocky exoplanets dynamic evolution requires better understanding of key internal thermophysical processes that shaped their geological surfaces, heat fluxes, volatiles and atmospheric content. New high-pressure experiments on…
An asteroid family is typically formed when a larger parent body undergoes a catastrophic collisional disruption, and as such family members are expected to show physical properties that closely trace the composition and mineralogical…
Over the course of the past two decades, observational surveys have unveiled the intricate orbital structure of the Kuiper Belt, a field of icy bodies orbiting the Sun beyond Neptune. In addition to a host of readily-predictable orbital…
The European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft passed by the main belt asteroid (21) Lutetia the 10th July 2010. With its ~100km size, Lutetia is one of the largest asteroids ever imaged by a spacecraft. During the flyby, the on-board…
Asteroid modeling efforts in the last decade resulted in a comprehensive dataset of almost 400 convex shape models and their rotation states. This amount already provided a deep insight into physical properties of main-belt asteroids or…
We study the stars of the binary system 16 Cygni to determine with high precision their chemical composition. Knowing that the component B has a detected planet of at least 1.5 Jupiter masses, we investigate if there are chemical…
Methods. We algorithmically tracked thousands of individual particles through four OSIRIS/NAC image sequences of 67P's near-nucleus coma. We then traced concentrated particle groups back to the nucleus surface, and estimated their potential…
The cohesion of particles has a significant effect on the properties of small bodies. In this study, we measured in open air, the cohesive forces of tens of micron-sized irregularly shaped meteorite, silica sand, glass powder, and spherical…
Asteroids formed in a dynamically quiescent disk but their orbits became gravitationally stirred enough by Jupiter to lead to high-speed collisions. As a result, many dozen large asteroids have been disrupted by impacts over the age of the…
Some asteroids eject dust, unexpectedly producing transient, comet-like comae and tails. First ascribed to the sublimation of near-surface water ice, mass losing asteroids (also called "main-belt comets") can in fact be driven by a…
A new family classification, based on a catalog of proper elements with $\sim 384,000$ numbered asteroids and on new methods is available. For the $45$ dynamical families with $>250$ members identified in this classification, we present an…
The Earth's inner core plays a vital role in the dynamics of our planet and is itself strongly exposed to dynamic processes as evidenced by a complex pattern of elastic structure. To gain deeper insight into the nature of these processes we…
Asteroids and meteorites provide key evidence on the formation of planetesimals in the Solar System. Asteroids are traditionally thought to form in a bottom-up process by coagulation within a population of initially km-scale planetesimals.…
A recent stellar occultation revealed that the Centaur (2060) Chiron hosts a broad disk extending beyond ~200 km from its centre, embedding three ring-like structures (Chi1R, Chi2R, and Chi3R), while a tenuous outer ring (Chi4R) lies beyond…