Bulletin of the American Physical Society
2007 APS Four Corners Section/SPS Zone 16 Joint Fall Meeting
Volume 52, Number 14
Friday–Saturday, October 19–20, 2007; Flagstaff, Arizona
Session G3: Astro: Kuiper Belt Objects |
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Chair: David Kieda, University of Utah Room: Chemistry (Bldg. 20) Room 233 |
Saturday, October 20, 2007 8:15AM - 8:51AM |
G3.00001: Physical Properties of Kuiper Belt Objects Invited Speaker: The discovery of the first object in the Kuiper belt -- a formerly hypothetical ancient reservoir of icy objects located beyond Neptune's orbit -- started a revolution in our understanding of the outer Solar System; there was no longer a sharp edge to our planetary system at Pluto's orbit. About 1000 Kuiper belt objects (KBOs), intermediate in size between comets and planets, are now known to exist on orbits about the Sun. Since KBOs are the preserved building blocks of an outer Solar System planet, studying their physical and chemical properties provides an opportunity for a better understanding of the formation and evolution of the Solar System. Here we describe the progress made by ground-based and orbiting telescopes in studying the physical and chemical properties of KBOs over the last 15 years. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, October 20, 2007 8:51AM - 9:27AM |
G3.00002: Seeing Double -- The Discovery of Binaries in the Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt Invited Speaker: The demotion of Pluto as a planet really started in 1978 with the discovery of its moon Charon. Once it was known to be in a binary system, it was just a matter of time before the determination of Pluto's mass, along with the discovery of other transneptunian objects (TNOs), would lead to its declassification. This example highlights the fact that binary discoveries are critical for determining the mass of TNOs in the Kuiper belt. If we can determine the orbit of a binary system, we can find the mass. An independent measurement of the size of the components then leads to a determination of the bulk density. From the bulk density we can deduce the characteristic composition and structure of these objects. The successful measurement of these fundamental quantities has and will continue to advance our theories on the formation, structure, and evolution of bodies in the outer solar system. This talk focuses on the discovery of binary systems in the Kuiper belt and the current state of our knowledge. To date there are over 50 confirmed binary systems, a number that is an extreme lower limit to the true binary population. In this talk, I'll highlight past and current searches led by Keith Noll (STScI) to find binary systems using the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). My role in this research will be discussed and will lead to a discussion on some of the techniques we are using to identify binary systems at extremely small angular resolutions. Members of our group led by Will Grundy (Lowell Observatory) are calculating orbits for a few of the binary systems, and highlights of his results will be presented. The talk will then conclude with some statistics relating the binary frequency of TNOs to their dynamical classes, and explore what this could imply about the structure and formation of the Kuiper belt. [Preview Abstract] |
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