Related papers: Coupled shape and spin evolution of small near sph…
We aim to understand how landslides affect the shape and rotational motion of small rubble planetary bodies. We limit ourselves to axisymmetric global landslides, and take the primordial shape of the body to also be axisymmetric. The…
Conditions for regolith landslides to occur on spinning, gravitating spheroidal asteroids and their aftermath are studied. These conditions are developed by application of classical granular mechanics stability analysis to the asteroid…
The regolith-covered surfaces of asteroids preserve records of geophysical processes that have occurred both at their surfaces and sometimes also in their interiors. As a result of the unique micro-gravity environment that these bodies…
This paper studies the long-term migration of disturbed regolith materials on the surface of Solar System small bodies from the viewpoint of nonlinear dynamics. We propose an approximation model for secular mass movement, which combines the…
We studied the creep motion of granular materials in a gradient potential field that is created using a slow spin-up experiment device. Natural sand confined in the acrylic box is spun up by a controlled turntable and the surface flows are…
The migration of cohesive regolith on the surface of an otherwise monolithic or strong asteroid is studied using theoretical and simulation models. The theory and simulations show that under an increasing spin rate (such as due to the YORP…
Seismic shaking is an attractive mechanism to explain the destabilisation of regolith slopes and the regolith migration found on the surfaces of asteroids (Richardson et al. 2004; Miyamoto et al. 2007). Here, we use a continuum mechanics…
A model for the asteroid resurfacing by regolith convection is built to estimate its timescale. In the model, regolith convection is driven by the impact-induced global seismic shaking. The model consists of three steps: (i) intermittent…
An asteroid spun up to its critical limit has unique surface mechanical properties that its gravity and the centrifugal force largely balance, creating a relaxation environment where low-energy events such as mass shedding may trigger…
Our investigation is motivated by the recent discovery of asteroids orbiting the Sun and simultaneously staying near one of the Solar System planets for a long time. This regime of motion is usually called the quasi-satellite regime, since…
The scaling of physical forces to the extremely low ambient gravitational acceleration regimes found on the surfaces of small asteroids is performed. Resulting from this, it is found that van der Waals cohesive forces between regolith…
Proximity observations by OSIRIS-REx and Hayabusa2 provided clues on the shape evolution processes of the target asteroids, (101955) Bennu and (162173) Ryugu. Their oblate shapes with equatorial ridges, or the so-called top shapes, may have…
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…
In the near-Earth asteroid population, binary and triple systems have been discovered with mutual orbits that have significant eccentricities as well as large semi-major axes. All known systems with eccentric orbits and all widely-separated…
In situ observations of small asteroids show that surfaces covered by boulders and coarse terrain are frequent on such bodies. Regolith grain sizes have distributions on approximately mm and cm scales, and the behavior of such large grains…
The rotational mass loss has been realized to be a prevalent mechanism to produce low-speed debris near the asteroid, and the size composition of the asteroid's surface regolith has been closely measured by in situ explorations. However,…
While the number of asteroids with known shapes has drastically increased over the past few years, little is known on the the time-evolution of shapes and the underlying physical processes. Here we propose an averaged abrasion model based…
The dynamical evolution of binary asteroid systems is deeply influenced by spin-orbit resonances. However, their domains of influence and mutual interactions remain elusive, in particular in the space where multiple resonant modes coexist.…
The angle between the stellar spin and the planetary orbit axes (spin-orbit angle) is supposed to carry valuable information on the initial condition of the planet formation and the subsequent migration history. Indeed current observations…
The dusty regolith covering the surfaces of asteroids and planetary satellites differs in size, shape, and composition from terrestrial soil particles and is subject to very different environmental conditions. Experimental studies of the…