On the origin of Triton and Pluto
@article{McKinnon1984OnTO, title={On the origin of Triton and Pluto}, author={William B. McKinnon}, journal={Nature}, year={1984}, volume={311}, pages={355 - 358} }
Lyttleton hypothesized long ago that Triton and Pluto originated as adjacent prograde satellites of Neptune1. With the presently accepted masses of Triton and Pluto–Charon2,3, however, the momentum and energy exchange that would be required to set Triton on a retrograde trajectory is impossible. The mass of Triton has probably been seriously overestimated4,5, but not by enough to relax this restriction. It is implausible that the present angular momentum state of Pluto–Charon has been…
106 Citations
On the Origin of the Pluto System
- Physics, Geology
- 2020
For six decades following its discovery, Pluto was the only known Sun-orbiting world in the dynamical vicinity of Neptune. An early origin concept postulated that Neptune originally had two large…
The Origin and Composition of Pluto and Charon: Chemically Uniform Models
- Physics, Geology
- 1993
Observations of the Pluto-Charon system using the Hubble Space Telescope are soon to provide another test of the modern Laplacian theory of solar system origin. According to this theory, Pluto,…
Pluto's structure and composition suggest origin in the solar, not a planetary, nebula
- Geology, PhysicsNature
- 1988
The mean density of the Pluto-Charon system is now accurately known at 1.99±0.09 g cm–3 (With formal errors five times smaller)1, through observations of total occultations and transits2. Even…
A Giant Impact Origin of Pluto-Charon
- Geology, PhysicsScience
- 2005
Hydrodynamic simulations are used to demonstrate that the formation of Pluto-Charon by means of a large collision is quite plausible, and suggest that collisions between 1000-kilometer-class objects occurred in the early inner Kuiper belt.
CONSTRAINTS ON THE ORBITAL EVOLUTION OF TRITON
- Physics, Geology
- 2005
We present simulations of Triton's postcapture orbit that confirm the importance of Kozai-type oscillations in its orbital elements. In the context of the tidal orbital evolution model, these…
Neptune's Triton: A moon rich in dry ice and carbon
- Physics, Geology
- 1989
The encounter of the spacecraft Voyager 2 with Neptune and its large satellite Triton in August 1989 will provide a crucial test of ideas regarding the origin and chemical composition of the outer…
The origin of Pluto's peculiar orbit
- Geology, PhysicsNature
- 1993
THE origin of Pluto's unusual orbitthe most eccentric and inclined of all the planetsremains a mystery. The orbits of Pluto and Neptune overlap, but close approaches of these two planets are…
References
SHOWING 1-10 OF 33 REFERENCES
Diameters of Triton and Pluto
- Physics, GeologyNature
- 1982
Triton, the major satellite of Neptune, and Pluto, the outermost planet, are too small and distant to permit direct measurement of their size, and indirect arguments must be used to estimate diameter…
Tidal evolution and the Pluto-Charon system
- Physics, Geology
- 1979
We analyze the system formed by Pluto and its satellite Charon from the point of view of the theory of tidal evolution. The singular feature of the system, i.e. the configuration of complete…
Gas drag in primordial circumplanetary envelopes: A mechanism for satellite capture
- Physics, Geology
- 1979
Methane on Triton and Pluto: new CCD spectra
- Physics, Geology
- 1983
Spectra of Triton and of Pluto from 4553-9558 A at 25 A resolution are presented. Both spectra show the methane absorption near 8900 A; its equivalent width was 16 times greater on Pluto than on…
Unidentified features in the spectrum of Triton
- Physics, GeologyNature
- 1981
Water frost has been identified on the surfaces of the satellites of Jupiter1, Saturn2 and Uranus3,4; methane frost is dominant on Pluto5–7. However, although the IR spectrum of Triton, the largest…
Origin of the Moon — Capture by gas drag of the Earth's primordial atmosphere
- Physics, Geology
- 1983
We propose a new scenario of the lunar origin, which is a natural extension of planetary formation processes studied so far by us in Kyoto. According to these studies, the Earth grew up in a gaseous…
The radius and ellipticity of Uranus from its occultation of SAO 158687
- Physics, Geology
- 1980
From occultation timings obtained from the Kuiper Airborne Observatory and from Cape Town for Mar. 10, 1977 occultation of SAO 158687 by Uranus, the equatorial radius, Re, of the planet has been…