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Register a new userParticles co-orbital to Janus and Epimetheus: a firefly planetary ring
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The Cassini spacecraft found a new and unique ring that shares the trajectory of Janus and Epimetheus, co-orbital satellites of Saturn. Performing image analysis, we found this to be a continuous ring. Its width is between 30% and 50% larger than previously announced. We also verified that the ring behaves like a firefly. It can only be seen from time to time, when Cassini, the ring and the Sun are arranged in a particular geometric configuration, in very high phase angles. Otherwise, it remains in the dark, not visible to Cassinis cameras. Through numerical simulations, we found a very short lifetime for the ring particles, less than a couple of decades. Consequently, the ring needs to be constantly replenished. Using a model of particles production due to micrometeorites impacts on the surfaces of Janus and Epimetheus, we reproduce the ring, explaining its existence and the firefly behavior.
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We present an analytical model to study the dynamics of the outer edge of Saturns A ring. The latter is influenced by 7:6 mean motion resonances with Janus and Epimetheus. Because of the horseshoe motion of the two co-orbital moons, the ring edge particles are alternately trapped in a corotation eccentricity resonance (CER) or a Lindblad eccentricity resonance (LER). However, the resonance oscillation periods are longer than the 4-year interval between the switches in the orbits of Janus and Epimetheus. Averaged equations of motion are used, and our model is numerically integrated to describe the effects of the periodic sweeping of the 7:6 CERs and LERs over the ring edge region. We show that four radial zones (ranges 136715-136723, 136738-136749, 136756-136768, 136783-136791 km) are chaotic on decadal timescales, within which particle semi-major axes have periodic changes due to partial libration motions around the CER fixed points. After a few decades, the maximum variation of semi-major axis is about 11 km (respectively 3 km) in the case of the CER with Janus (respectively Epimetheus). Similarly, particle eccentricities have partial oscillations forced by the LERs every 4 yr. For initially circular orbits, the maximum eccentricity reached is ~0.001. We apply our work to Peggy, an object recently discovered at the ring edge, confirming that it is strongly perturbed by the Janus 7:6 LER. The CER has currently no effect on that body, nevertheless the fitted semi-major axes are just outside the chaotic zone of radial range 136756-136768 km.
Planets close to their stars are thought to form farther out and migrate inward due to angular momentum exchange with gaseous protoplanetary disks. This process can produce systems of planets in co-orbital (Trojan or 1:1) resonance, in which two planets share the same orbit, usually separated by 60 degrees. Co-orbital systems are detectable among the planetary systems found by the Kepler mission either directly or by transit timing variations. However, no co-orbital systems have been found within the thousands of Kepler planets and candidates. Here we study the orbital evolution of co-orbital planets embedded in a protoplanetary disk using a grid-based hydrodynamics code. We show that pairs of similar-mass planets in co-orbital resonance are disrupted during large-scale orbital migration. Destabilization occurs when one or both planets is near the critical mass needed to open a gap in the gaseous disk. A confined gap is opened that spans the 60 degree azimuthal separation between planets. This alters the torques imparted by the disk on each planet -- pushing the leading planet outward and the trailing planet inward -- and disrupts the resonance. The mechanism applies to systems in which the two planets masses differ by a factor of two or less. In a simple flared disk model the critical mass for gap opening varies from a few Earth masses at the inner edge of the disk to 1 Saturn-mass at 5 AU. A pair of co-orbital planets with masses in this range that migrates will enter a region where the planets are at the gap-opening limit. At that point the resonance is disrupted. We therefore predict an absence of planets on co-orbital configurations with masses in the super-Earth to Saturn mass range with similar masses.
We consider reshaping of closed Janus filaments acquiring intrinsic curvature upon actuation of an active component -- a nematic elastomer elongating upon phase transition. Linear stability analysis establishes instability thresholds of circles with no imposed twist, dependent on the ratio $q$ of the intrinsic curvature to the inverse radius of the original circle. Twisted circles are proven to be absolutely unstable but the linear analysis well predicts the dependence of the looping number of the emerging configurations on the imposed twist. Modeling stable configurations by relaxing numerically the overall elastic energy detects multiple stable and metastable states with different looping numbers. The bifurcation of untwisted circles turns out to be subcritical, so that nonplanar shapes with a lower energy exist at $q$ below the critical value. The looping number of stable shapes generally increases with $q$.
The G ring arc hosts the smallest satellite of Saturn, Aegaeon, observed with a set of images sent by Cassini spacecraft. Along with Aegaeon, the arc particles are trapped in a 7:6 corotation eccentric resonance with the satellite Mimas. Due to this resonance, both Aegaeon and the arc material are confined to within sixty degrees of corotating longitudes. The arc particles are dust grains which can have their orbital motions severely disturbed by the solar radiation force. Our numerical simulations showed that Aegaeon is responsible for depleting the arc dust population by removing them through collisions. The solar radiation force hastens these collisions by removing most of the 10$~mu$m sized grains in less than 40 years. Some debris released from Aegaeons surface by meteoroid impacts can populate the arc. However, it would take 30,000 years for Aegaeon to supply the observed amount of arc material, and so it is unlikely that Aegaeon alone is the source of dust in the arc.
Thermodynamically, bosons and fermions differ by their statistics only. A general entropy functional is proposed by superposition of entropic terms, typical for different quantum gases. The statistical properties of the corresponding Janus particles are derived by variation of the weight of the boson/fermion fraction. It is shown that di-bosons and anti-fermions separate in gas and liquid phases, while three-phase equilibrium appears for poly-boson/fermion Janus particles.
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