Neptune's capture of its moon Triton in a binary-planet gravitational encounter

Nature

Volumn 441, Issue 7090, 2006, Pages 192-194

  Agnor, Craig B ^a   Hamilton, Douglas P ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^b Bldg 142   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ASTROPHYSICS; GALAXIES; MATHEMATICAL MODELS; ORBITS; SATELLITES;

CIRCULAR ORBITS; NEPTUNE'S CAPTURE; PLAUSIBLE CHARACTERISTICS; RETROGRADE ORBITS;

SOLAR SYSTEM;

GRAVITY; NEPTUNE; PLUTO; SATELLITE; SOLAR SYSTEM; TRITON;

ARTICLE; ASTRONOMY; DYNAMICS; ENERGY; GRAVITY; PRIORITY JOURNAL; SIMULATION;

EID: 33646563439     PISSN: 00280836     EISSN: 14764687     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1038/nature04792     Document Type: Article

References (30)

1. McCord, T. B. Dynamical evolution of the Neptunian system. Astron. J. 71, 585-590 (1966).
2. McKinnon, W. B. On the origin of Triton and Pluto. Nature 311, 355-358 (1984).
3. McKinnon, W. B., Lunine, J. I. & Banfield, D. Neptune and Triton (ed. Cruikshank, D. P.) 807-877 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1995).
4. Pollack, J. B., Burns, J. A. & Tauber, M. E. Gas drag in primordial circumplanetary envelopes - A mechanism for satellite capture. Icarus 37, 587-611 (1979).
5. McKinnon, W. B. & Leith, A. C. Gas drag and the orbital evolution of a captured Triton. Icarus 118, 392-413 (1995).
6. Goldreich, P., Murray, N., Longaretti, P. Y. & Banfield, D. Neptune's story. Science 245, 500-504 (1989).
7. Heggie, D. C. Binary evolution in stellar dynamics. Mon. Not R. Astron. Soc. 173, 729-787 (1975).
8. Hills, J. G. Computer simulations of encounters between massive black holes and binaries. Astron. J. 102, 704-715 (1991).
9. Funato, Y., Makino, J., Hut, P., Kokubo, E. & Kinoshita, D. The formation of Kuiper-belt binaries through exchange reactions. Nature 427, 518-520 (2004).
10. 12 (Sedna). Astron. J. 128, 2564-2576 (2004).
11. Tsui, K. H. Satellite capture in a four-body system. Planet. Space Sci. 50, 269-276 (2002).
12. Durda, D. D. et al. The formation of asteroid satellites in large impacts: results from numerical simulations. Icarus 170, 243-257 (2004).
13. Weidenschilling, S. J. On the origin of binary transneptunian objects. Icarus 160, 212-215 (2002).
14. Goldreich, P., Lithwick, Y. & Sari, R. Formation of Kuiper-belt binaries by dynamical friction and three-body encounters. Nature 420, 643-646 (2002).
15. Astakhov, S. A., Lee, E. A. & Farrelly, D. Formation of Kuiper-belt binaries through multiple chaotic scattering encounters with low-mass intrudes. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 360, 401-415 (2005).
16. Canup, R. M. A giant impact origin of Pluto-Charon. Science 307, 546-550 (2005).
17. Margot, J. L. et al. Binary asteroids in the near-earth object population. Science 296, 1445-1448 (2002).
18. Merline, W. J. et al. Asteroids III (eds Bottke, W. F. Jr, Cellino, A., Paolicchi, P. & Binzel, R. P.) 289-312 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 2002).
19. Stephens, D. C. & Noll, K. S. Detection of six trans-neptunian binaries with NICMOS: A high fraction of binaries in the cold classical disk. Astron. J. 131, 1142-1148 (2006).
20. Hamilton, D. P. & Burns, J. A. Orbital stability zones about asteroids. II - The destabilizing effects of eccentric orbits and of solar radiation. Icarus 96, 43-64 (1992).
21. Asphaug, E. & Benz, W. Size density, and structure of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 inferred from the physics of tidal breakup. Icarus 121, 225-248 (1996).
22. Ćuk, M. & Gladman, B. J. Constraints on the orbital evolution of Triton. Astrophys. J. 626, L113-L116 (2005).
23. Hamilton, D. P., Zhang, K. & Agnor, C. B. Constraints on Triton's orbital evolution. AAS/Div. Dyn. Astron. Meet. 36(2), 11.04 (2005).
24. Goldreich, P. & Soter, S. Q in the Solar System. Icarus 5, 375-389 (1966).
25. Benner, L. A. M. & McKinnon, W. B. Orbital behaviour of captured satellites: The effect of solar gravity on Triton's postcapture orbit. Icarus 114, 1-20 (1995).
26. Lissauer, J. J., Pollack, J. B., Wetherill, G. W. & Stevenson, D. J. Neptune and Triton (ed. Cruikshank, D. P.) 37-108 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1995).
27. Hahn, J. M. & Malhotra, R. Orbital evolution of planets embedded in a planetesimal disk. Astron. J. 117, 3041-3053 (1999).
28. Gomes, R. S., Morbidelli, A. & Levison, H. F. Planetary migration in a planetesimal disk: why did Neptune stop at 30 AU? Icarus 170, 492-507 (2004).
29. Ward, W. R., Agnor, C. B. & Tanaka, H. in Astrophysical Ages and Time Scales (eds von Hippel, T., Simpson, C. & Manset, N.) 111-120 (ASP Conf. Ser. 245, Astronomical Society of the Pacific, San Francisco, 2001).
30. Goldreich, P., Lithwick, Y. & Sari, R. Planet formation by coagulation: a focus on Uranus and Neptune. Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 42, 549-601 (2004).