| Issue |
A&A
Volume 690, October 2024
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | A395 | |
| Number of page(s) | 8 | |
| Section | Planets and planetary systems | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202451920 | |
| Published online | 23 October 2024 | |
Ejected from home: C/1980 E1 (Bowell) and C/2024 L5 (ATLAS)
1
AEGORA Research Group, Facultad de Ciencias Matemáticas, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria,
28040
Madrid,
Spain
2
Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria,
28040
Madrid,
Spain
3
Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge,
Madingley Road,
Cambridge
CB3 0HA,
UK
★ Corresponding author; rauldelafuentemarcos@ucm.es
Received:
19
August
2024
Accepted:
25
September
2024
Context. Natural interstellar objects do not form isolated in deep space, but escape their natal planetary systems. Early removal from their home star systems via close flybys with still-forming planets could be the dominant ejection mechanism. However, dynamically evolved planetary systems such as the Solar System may also be a significant source of natural interstellar objects.
Aims. We studied the dynamical evolution of two unusual Solar System hyperbolic comets, C/1980 E1 (Bowell) and C/2024 L5 (ATLAS), to investigate the circumstances that led them to reach moderate Solar System excess hyperbolic speeds.
Methods. We used N-body simulations and statistical analyses to explore the planetary encounters that led to the ejection of C/1980 E1 and C/2024 L5, and studied their pre- and post-encounter trajectories.
Results. We confirm that C/1980 E1 reached its present path into interstellar space after an encounter with Jupiter at 0.23 au on December 9, 1980. C/2024 L5 was scattered out of the Solar System following a flyby to Saturn at 0.003 au on January 24, 2022. Integrations backward in time show that C/1980 E1 came from the inner Oort cloud but C/2024 L5 could be a former retrograde, inactive Centaur. The receding velocities of C/1980 E1 and C/2024 L5 when entering interstellar space will be 3.8 and 2.8 km s−1, moving towards Aries and Triangulum, respectively.
Conclusions. Our results for two comets ejected from the Solar System indicate that dynamically evolved planetary systems can be effective sources of interstellar objects and provide constraints on their velocity distribution.
Key words: methods: numerical / space vehicles / celestial mechanics / comets: general / comets: individual: C/1980 E1 (Bowell) / comets: individual: C/2024 L5 (ATLAS)
© The Authors 2024
Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
This article is published in open access under the Subscribe to Open model. Subscribe to A&A to support open access publication.
Current usage metrics show cumulative count of Article Views (full-text article views including HTML views, PDF and ePub downloads, according to the available data) and Abstracts Views on Vision4Press platform.
Data correspond to usage on the plateform after 2015. The current usage metrics is available 48-96 hours after online publication and is updated daily on week days.
Initial download of the metrics may take a while.