The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit

Details The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit

Jan 2012

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2012icar..217..355g&link_type=abstract

Icarus, Volume 217, Issue 1, p. 355-366.

Statistics

1

Scientific paper

Canada's Near-Earth Object Surveillance Satellite (NEOSSat), set to launch in early 2012, will search for and track Near-Earth Objects (NEOs), tuning its search to best detect objects with a < 1.0 AU. In order to construct an optimal pointing strategy for NEOSSat, we needed more detailed information in the a < 1.0 AU region than the best current model (Bottke, W.F., Morbidelli, A., Jedicke, R., Petit, J.M., Levison, H.F., Michel, P., Metcalfe, T.S. [2002]. Icarus 156, 399-433) provides. We present here the NEOSSat-1.0 NEO orbital distribution model with larger statistics that permit finer resolution and less uncertainty, especially in the a < 1.0 AU region. We find that Amors = 30.1 ± 0.8%, Apollos = 63.3 ± 0.4%, Atens = 5.0 ± 0.3%, Atiras (0.718 < Q < 0.983 AU) = 1.38 ± 0.04%, and Vatiras (0.307 < Q < 0.718 AU) = 0.22 ± 0.03% of the steady-state NEO population. Vatiras are a previously undiscussed NEO population clearly defined in our integrations, whose orbits lie completely interior to that of Venus. Our integrations also uncovered the unexpected production of retrograde orbits from main-belt asteroid sources; this retrograde NEA population makes up ≃0.1% of the steady-state NEO population. The relative NEO impact rate onto Mercury, Venus, and Earth, as well as the normalized distribution of impact speeds, was calculated from the NEOSSat-1.0 orbital model under the assumption of a steady-state. The new model predicts a slightly higher Mercury impact flux.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and The orbital distribution of Near-Earth Objects inside Earth's orbit will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-911277