On the existence of regular and irregular outer moons orbiting the Pluto-Charon system

Abstract

The dwarf planet Pluto is known to host an extended system of five co-planar satellites. Previous studies have explored the formation and evolution of the system in isolation, neglecting perturbative effects by the Sun. Here we show that secular evolution due to the Sun can strongly affect the evolution of outer satellites and rings in the system, if such exist. Although precession due to extended gravitational potential from the inner Pluto-Charon binary quench such secular evolution up to $a_{crit}\sim 0.0035$ AU ($\sim 0.09$ $R_{Hill}$ the Hill radius; including all of the currently known satellites), outer orbits can be significantly altered. In particular, we find that \emph{co-planar} rings and satellites should not exist beyond $a_{crit}$; rather, satellites and dust particles in these regions secularly evolve on timescales ranging between $10^4-10^6$ yrs, and quasi-periodically change their inclinations and eccentricities through secular evolution (Lidov-Kozai oscillations). Such oscillations can lead to high inclinations and eccentricities, constraining the range where such satellites (and dust particles) can exist without crossing the orbits of the inner satellites, or crossing the outer Hill stability range. Outer satellites, if such exist are therefore likely to be \emph{irregular} satellites, with orbits limited to be non-circular and/or highly inclined. These could be potentially detected and probed by the New-Horizon mission, possibly providing direct evidence for the secular evolution of the Pluto satellite system, and shedding new light on its origins.

Comments are welcome

References in corpus (10)

• Satellite dynamics on the Laplace surface
• A triple origin for the lack of tight coplanar circumbinary planets around short-period binaries
• Survival of Planets Around Shrinking Stellar Binaries
• New Horizons: Anticipated Scientific Investigations at the Pluto System
• Secular dynamics of hierarchical quadruple systems: the case of a triple system orbited by a fourth body
• Generalized Hill-Stability Criteria for Hierarchical Three-Body Systems at Arbitrary Inclinations
• No circumbinary planets transiting the tightest Kepler binaries - a possible fingerprint of a third star
• Secular dynamics in hierarchical three-body systems with mass loss and mass transfer
• On the Origin of Pluto's Small Satellites by Resonant Transport
• Evolution of a ring around the Pluto-Charon binary

Cited by in corpus (9)

• Stability of exomoons around the Kepler transiting circumbinary planets
• The Wide-Binary Origin of The Pluto-Charon System
• A Pluto-Charon Sonata: The Dynamical Architecture of the Circumbinary Satellite System
• A Pluto--Charon Sonata: Dynamical Limits on the Masses of the Small Satellites
• A Pluto--Charon Concerto II. Formation of a Circumbinary Disk of Debris After the Giant Impact
• Orbit determination of the moons of the Pluto-Charon system
• Orbital analysis of the Pluto-Charon moon system's mutual interactions and forced frequencies
• Dynamical environments of (486958) Arrokoth: prior evolution and present state
• A Pluto--Charon Sonata IV. Improved Constraints on the Dynamical Behavior and Masses of the Small Satellites