Predicting the water content of interstellar objects from galactic star formation histories

Abstract

Planetesimals inevitably bear the signatures of their natal environment, preserving in their composition a record of the metallicity of their system's original gas and dust, albeit one altered by the formation process. When planetesimals are dispersed from their system of origin, this record is carried with them. As each star is likely to contribute at least $10^{12}$ interstellar objects, the Galaxy's drifting population of interstellar objects (ISOs) provides an overview of the properties of its stellar population through time. Using the EAGLE cosmological simulation and models of protoplanetary formation, our modelling predicts an ISO population with a bimodal distribution in their water mass fraction. Objects formed in low-metallicity, typically older, systems have a higher water fraction than their counterparts formed in high-metallicity protoplanetary disks, and these water-rich objects comprise the majority of the population. Both detected ISOs seem to belong to the lower water fraction population; these results suggest they come from recently formed systems. We show that the population of ISOs in galaxies with different star formation histories will have different proportions of objects with high and low water fractions. This work suggests that it is possible that the upcoming Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time will detect a large enough population of ISOs to place useful constraints on models of protoplanetary disks, as well as galactic structure and evolution.

arXiv commentAccepted by ApJ Letters, 9 pages

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• From a Different Star: 3I/ATLAS in the context of the Ōtautahi-Oxford interstellar object population model
• How the origin of stars in the Galaxy impacts the composition of planetary building blocks
• The Galactic Interstellar Object Population: A Framework for Prediction and Inference
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• Chasing Nomadic Worlds: A New Class of Deep Space Missions