Transitional and temporary objects in the Jupiter Trojan area

Astronomiska Observatoriet, Uppsala Universitet, Box 515, 751 20 Uppsala, Sweden

Corresponding author: Ola.Karlsson@astro.uu.se

Received: 4 March 2003
Accepted: 4 September 2003

Abstract

I have integrated 1233 objects with semimajor axes between 4.6 and 5.8 AU 1000 years back and forward in time. A search for Jupiter horseshoe Trojans in transition from tadpole orbits to non-Trojan orbits and objects in temporary horseshoe orbits was made. A total of 13 objects (5 comets, 3 asteroids and 5 Trojans) were found. In a second group, among 337 new Trojans discovered after the primary investigation, 7 transitional candidates were found. Two objects, 2000 HR₂₄ and 2002 GP₃₁, are falsely identified as Trojans. No likely transitional objects were found in the first object set, but all of them have at least temporary captures in orbit types associated with Jupiter's 1:1 mean motion resonance. Trojans in the first set have short observational arcs which can explain the low probability for a Trojan past. Trojans in the second set have longer arcs and 5 of them are good candidates for being in transition from the Trojan area.