Astronomy12 papers
The Yarkovsky effect
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Ivana Milić Žitnik
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The Yarkovsky Effect on the Long-term Evolution of Binary Asteroids
Wen-Han 文翰 Zhou 周 et al. (2024)
- Published
- Jun 1, 2024
- Journal
- The Astrophysical Journal Letters · Vol. 968 · No. 1
- DOI
- 10.3847/2041-8213/ad4f7f
At a Glance
Shows Yarkovsky forces can rapidly reshape binary-asteroid orbits, driving satellites toward synchrony or ejection on ~0.1 Myr timescales.
Summary
This paper elevates the often-neglected Yarkovsky force to a key driver of small binary-asteroid evolution, alongside tides and BYORP. It develops an analytic “binary Yarkovsky” model that combines eclipse-driven Yarkovsky–Schach (YS) forcing with a weaker, opposing planetary Yarkovsky term, and validates the scaling against thermophysical simulations. The main implication is a set of new evolutionary pathways: prograde asynchronous secondaries are pushed toward the synchronous-orbit location (often faster than tides and possibly competitive with stochastic YORP), while retrograde secondaries are driven outward, potentially creating asteroid pairs with opposite spin poles. The work also makes mission-testable predictions, including a potentially measurable post-DART orbital shrinkage rate for Dimorphos if it was knocked out of synchronous rotation, and suggests Yarkovsky-assisted synchronization for the wide Dinkinesh–Selam system where tides are too weak.
Method Snapshot
Analytical orbit-averaged radiation-force modeling of eclipse-modulated thermal recoil, benchmarked with thermophysical numerical simulations of a simplified binary.
Background
Background in asteroid thermophysics and spin–orbit dynamics (Yarkovsky/YORP, tides, and binary orbital evolution).