The Orbits and Masses of the Martian Satellites and the Libration of Phobos

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy

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Scientific paper

Our Martian satellite orbits are based on numerical integration of the satellites' equations of motion. We take into account the mutual interactions of Phobos and Deimos, the perturbations due to the Earth, Moon, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Sun, the asphericity of Mars, the tide raised on Mars by Phobos, and the Phobos figure. We fit the numerically integrated orbits to the complete set of Earth-based and spacecraft-based observations from discovery through 2007. Among the data are the Doppler tracking of both the Viking 1 and Phobos 2 spacecraft acquired during close flybys of Phobos and the tracking of Viking 2 during its Deimos encounter. The tracking data provide information on the positions and the masses of the satellites. Our fit determined the epoch states and GMs of the satellites, the Phobos forced libration amplitude θ, and the Martian tidal quality factor Q. The respective values for the GMs of Phobos and Deimos are (7.104±0.006)x10-4 and (0.98±0.02)x10-4 km3s-2, θ = (1.1±0.2) deg, and Q = 76.6±0.2.

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