Movement of Low-albedo Dust from Small Irregular Satellites to the Main Satellites of the Outer Planets

Details Movement of Low-albedo Dust from Small Irregular Satellites to the Main Satellites of the Outer Planets Movement of Low-albedo Dust from Small Irregular Satellites to the Main Satellites of the Outer Planets

Sep 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009dps....41.1906b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS meeting #41, #19.06

Mathematics

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Scientific paper

The origin and nature of the low-albedo hemisphere of Iapetus represents one of the most intriguing problems in planetary science. Observations of the satellite have shown that the two hemispheres of the satellite are wholly different. The trailing hemisphere has an albedo, composition, and morphology typical of the other icy Saturnian satellites, while the surface of the leading side is composed of an extraordinarily low-albedo, reddish material that includes organic material and carbon. The study of pathological objects such as Iapetus offers clues to general alteration processes that might act throughout the outer Solar System. Bell et al. (1985, Icarus 61, 192) proposed just that by suggesting that Callisto was the Iapetus of the Jovian system in a less extreme manifestation. Unlike the other Galilean satellites, Callisto is darker on its leading side (except right at opposition), suggesting it may have swept up low-albedo dust in a process similar to that occurring on Iapetus. New medium resolution visible spectroscopy obtained from the Hale Telescope on Palomar Mountain shows hemispheric diversity on the Uranian satellites. The outermost satellites (Titania and Oberon) tend to be darker and redder on the leading side. Our hypothesis is that all of the outermost major satellites of Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus accrete reddish, low-albedo dust from the small, captured, outer retrograde satellites of these planets. The dust is kicked off by meteoritic impacts or by mutual collisions and spirals in by Poynting-Robertson drag to impact the leading sides of the outer larger satellites, including Iapetus, Callisto, Titania, and Oberon.

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