Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Sep 2006
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006dps....38.4204p&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #38, #42.04; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 38, p.560
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
2
Scientific paper
Our work explores the effects of gravitational perturbations on small patches of planetary rings of scale 104 km2 to 2 x 106 km2. The source of these perturbations is the time-dependent gravitational potential of a moonlet that is located in a gap within the rings. We use the numerical code pkdgrav to model the motions of 104-6 ring particles as they interact by self-gravity and collisions. The simulations focus on the edges of ring material closest to these perturbing moons - effectively the inner and outer edges of the gap.
The results of these simulations will be applicable to any dense debris system interacting gravitationally with nearby perturbers; however our current work has the main goal of simulating Saturn's Keeler gap, observed to harbor a moonlet named S/2005 S1. The presented techniques can also be applied easily to the Encke gap, which harbors its own moon, Pan. They may also give insight into the dynamics of protoplanets embedded in gaseous and/or planetesimal disks.
The Keeler and Encke gaps have been studied recently by the Cassini spacecraft, and these simulations have reproduced observed persistent ring/gap dynamical features, such as downstream edge waves, and allow for studies of accretion onto the gap moons - thereby constraining the mass, and potentially the size, of the moon. Our simulations show that the mass of S/2005 S1, estimated from measuring the resulting edge wave amplitude, may be too high by 25% or more. The difference may be attributable to the idealized assumptions of non-interacting ring particles made in the original estimate.
Perrine Randall P.
Richardson Chris D.
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