No Arabic abstract
The advanced rheological models of Andrade (1910) and Sundberg & Cooper (2010) are compared to the traditional Maxwell model to understand how each affects the tidal dissipation of heat within rocky bodies. We find both the Andrade and Sundberg-Cooper rheologies can produce at least 10$times$ the tidal heating compared to a traditional Maxwell model for a warm (1400-1600 K) Io-like satellite. Sundberg-Cooper can cause even larger dissipation around a critical temperature and frequency. These models allow cooler planets to stay tidally active in the face of orbital perturbations-a condition we term tidal resilience. This has implications for the time evolution of tidally active worlds, and the long-term equilibria they fall into. For instance, if Ios interior is better modeled by the Andrade or Sundberg-Cooper rheologies, the number of possible resonance-forming scenarios that still produce a hot, modern Io is expanded, and these scenarios do not require an early formation of the Laplace resonance. The two primary empirical parameters that define the Andrade anelasticity are examined in several phase spaces to provide guidance on how their uncertainties impact tidal outcomes, as laboratory studies continue to constrain their real values. We provide detailed reference tables on the fully general equations required for others to insert the Andrade and Sundberg-Cooper models into standard tidal formulae. Lastly, we show that advanced rheologies greatly impact the heating of short-period exoplanets and exomoons, while the properties of tidal resilience can mean a greater number of tidally active worlds among all extrasolar systems.
In Efroimsky & Makarov (2014), we derived from the first principles a formula for the tidal heating rate in a tidally perturbed homogeneous sphere. We compared it with the formulae used in the literature, and pointed out the differences. Using this result, we now present three case studies - Mercury, Kepler-10b, and a triaxial Io. A very sharp frequency-dependence of k2/Q near spin-orbit resonances yields a similarly sharp dependence of k2/Q on the spin rate. This indicates that physical libration may play a major role in tidal heating of synchronously rotating bodies. The magnitude of libration in the spin rate being defined by the planets triaxiality, the latter should be a factor determining the dissipation rate. Other parameters equal, a synchronously rotating body with a stronger triaxiality should generate more heat than a similar body of a more symmetrical shape. Further in the paper, we discuss scenarios where initially triaxial objects melt and lose their triaxiality. Thereafter, dissipation in them becomes less intensive; so the bodies freeze. The tidal bulge becomes a new permanent figure, with a new triaxiality lower than the original. In the paper, we also derive simplified, approximate expressions for dissipation rate in a rocky planet of the Maxwell rheology, with a not too small Maxwell time. The three expressions derived pertain to the cases of a synchronous spin, a 3:2 resonance, and a nonresonant rotation; so they can be applied to most close-in super-Earth exoplanets detected thus far. In such bodies, the rate of tidal heating outside of synchronous rotation is weakly dependent on the eccentricity and obliquity, provided both these parameters are small or moderate. According to our calculation, Kepler-10b could hardly survive the great amount of tidal heating without being synchronised, circularised and also reshaped through a complete or partial melt-down.
The majority of potentially habitable exoplanets detected orbit stars cooler than the Sun, and therefore are irradiated by a stellar spectrum peaking at longer wavelengths than that incident on Earth. Here, we present results from a set of simulations of tidally-locked terrestrial planets orbiting three different host stars to isolate the effect of the stellar spectra on the simulated climate. Specifically, we perform simulations based on TRAPPIST-1e, adopting an Earth-like atmosphere and using the UK Met Office Unified Model in an idealised aqua-planet configuration. Whilst holding the planetary parameters constant, including the total stellar flux (900 W/m$^2$) and orbital period (6.10 Earth days), we compare results between simulations where the stellar spectrum is that of a quiescent TRAPPIST-1, Proxima Centauri and the Sun. The simulations with cooler host stars had an increased proportion of incident stellar radiation absorbed directly by the troposphere compared to the surface. This, in turn, led to an increase in the stability against convection, a reduction in overall cloud coverage on the dayside (reducing scattering), leading to warmer surface temperatures. The increased direct heating of the troposphere also led to more efficient heat transport from the dayside to the nightside and, therefore, a reduced day-night temperature contrast. We inferred that planets with an Earth-like atmosphere orbiting cooler stars had lower dayside cloud coverage, potentially allowing habitable conditions at increased orbital radii, compared to similar planets orbiting hotter stars for a given planetary rotation rate.
Tidal torques play a key role in rotational dynamics of celestial bodies. They govern these bodies tidal despinning, and also participate in the subtle process of entrapment of these bodies into spin-orbit resonances. This makes tidal torques directly relevant to the studies of habitability of planets and their moons. Our work begins with an explanation of how friction and lagging should be built into the theory of bodily tides. Although much of this material can be found in various publications, a short but self-consistent summary on the topic has been lacking in the hitherto literature, and we are filling the gap. After these preparations, we address a popular concise formula for the tidal torque, which is often used in the literature, for planets or stars.We explain why the derivation of this expression, offered in the paper by Goldreich (1966; AJ 71, 1 - 7) and in the books by Kaula (1968, eqn. 4.5.29), and Murray & Dermott (1999, eqn. 4.159), implicitly sets the time lag to be frequency independent. Accordingly, the ensuing expression for the torque can be applied only to bodies having a very special (and very hypothetical) rheology which makes the time lag frequency independent, i.e, the same for all Fourier modes in the spectrum of tide. This expression for the torque should not be used for bodies of other rheologies. Specifically, the expression cannot be combined with an extra assertion of the geometric lag (or the phase lag) being constant, because at finite eccentricities the said assumption is incompatible with the constant-time-lag condition.
We use the distribution of extrasolar planets in circular orbits around stars with surface convective zones detected by ground based transit searches to constrain how efficiently tides raised by the planet are dissipated on the parent star. We parameterize this efficiency as a tidal quality factor (Q*). We conclude that the population of currently known planets is inconsistent with Q*<10^7 at the 99% level. Previous studies show that values of Q* between 10^5 and 10^7 are required in order to explain the orbital circularization of main sequence low mass binary stars in clusters, suggesting that different dissipation mechanisms might be acting in the two cases, most likely due to the very different tidal forcing frequencies relative to the stellar rotation frequency occurring for star--star versus planet--star systems.
Magmatic segregation and volcanic eruptions transport tidal heat from Ios interior to its surface. Several observed eruptions appear to be extremely high temperature ($geq$ 1600 K), suggesting either very high degrees of melting, refractory source regions, or large amounts of viscous heating on ascent. To address this ambiguity, we develop a model that couples crust and mantle dynamics to a simple compositional system. We analyse the model to investigate chemical structure and evolution. We demonstrate that magmatic segregation and volcanic eruptions lead to differentiation of the mantle, the extent of which depends on how easily high temperature melts from the more refractory lower mantle can migrate upwards. We propose that Ios highest temperature eruptions originate from this lower mantle region, and that such eruptions act to limit the degree of compositional differentiation.