Abstract
The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft successfully performed the first test of a kinetic impactor for asteroid deflection by impacting Dimorphos, the secondary of near-Earth binary asteroid (65803) Didymos, and changing the orbital period of Dimorphos. A change in orbital period of approximately 7 min was expected if the incident momentum from the DART spacecraft was directly transferred to the asteroid target in a perfectly inelastic collision1, but studies of the probable impact conditions and asteroid properties indicated that a considerable momentum enhancement (β) was possible2,3. In the years before impact, we used lightcurve observations to accurately determine the pre-impact orbit parameters of Dimorphos with respect to Didymos4,5,6. Here we report the change in the orbital period of Dimorphos as a result of the DART kinetic impact to be −33.0 ± 1.0 (3σ) min. Using new Earth-based lightcurve and radar observations, two independent approaches determined identical values for the change in the orbital period. This large orbit period change suggests that ejecta contributed a substantial amount of momentum to the asteroid beyond what the DART spacecraft carried.
| Originalsprog | Engelsk |
|---|---|
| Tidsskrift | Nature |
| Vol/bind | 616 |
| Udgave nummer | 7957 |
| Sider (fra-til) | 448-451 |
| Antal sider | 4 |
| ISSN | 0028-0836 |
| DOI | |
| Status | Udgivet - 2023 |
Bibliografisk note
Funding Information:This work was supported by the DART mission, NASA Contract No. 80MSFC20D0004. Part of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The work by P. Scheirich and P.P. was supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic, grant 20-04431S. They appreciate access to computing and storage facilities owned by parties and projects contributing to the National Grid Infrastructure MetaCentrum provided under the programme ‘Projects of Large Research, Development, and Innovations Infrastructures’ (CESNET LM2015042) and the CERIT Scientific Cloud LM2015085. The Green Bank Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. Observations at the Danish 1.54-m telescope were supported, in part, by the European Union H2020-SPACE-2018-2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 870403 (NEOROCKS). This work makes use of observations from the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope network. This paper includes data gathered with the 6.5-m Magellan Telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory, Chile, and is based on observations obtained at the Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) telescope, which is a joint project of the Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovações do Brasil (MCTI/LNA), the US National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) and Michigan State University (MSU). These results made use of the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) at Lowell Observatory. Lowell is a private, nonprofit institution dedicated to astrophysical research and public appreciation of astronomy and operates the LDT in partnership with Boston University, the University of Maryland, the University of Toledo, Northern Arizona University and Yale University. U.G.J. acknowledges funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation Interdisciplinary Synergy Programme grant no. NNF19OC0057374 and from the European Union H2020-MSCA-ITN-2019 grant no. 860470 (CHAMELEON). E.K. is supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea 2021M3F7A1082056. P.L.-P. was partly funded by ‘Programa de Iniciación en Investigación-Universidad de Antofagasta, INI-17-03’.
Funding Information:
This work was supported by the DART mission, NASA Contract No. 80MSFC20D0004. Part of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The work by P. Scheirich and P.P. was supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic, grant 20-04431S. They appreciate access to computing and storage facilities owned by parties and projects contributing to the National Grid Infrastructure MetaCentrum provided under the programme ‘Projects of Large Research, Development, and Innovations Infrastructures’ (CESNET LM2015042) and the CERIT Scientific Cloud LM2015085. The Green Bank Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. Observations at the Danish 1.54-m telescope were supported, in part, by the European Union H2020-SPACE-2018-2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 870403 (NEOROCKS). This work makes use of observations from the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope network. This paper includes data gathered with the 6.5-m Magellan Telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory, Chile, and is based on observations obtained at the Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) telescope, which is a joint project of the Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovações do Brasil (MCTI/LNA), the US National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) and Michigan State University (MSU). These results made use of the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) at Lowell Observatory. Lowell is a private, nonprofit institution dedicated to astrophysical research and public appreciation of astronomy and operates the LDT in partnership with Boston University, the University of Maryland, the University of Toledo, Northern Arizona University and Yale University. U.G.J. acknowledges funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation Interdisciplinary Synergy Programme grant no. NNF19OC0057374 and from the European Union H2020-MSCA-ITN-2019 grant no. 860470 (CHAMELEON). E.K. is supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea 2021M3F7A1082056. P.L.-P. was partly funded by ‘Programa de Iniciación en Investigación-Universidad de Antofagasta, INI-17-03’.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).