Spatial and Compositional Constraints on Non-ice Components and H2O on Pluto's Surface

We present four new near-infrared spectra of Pluto, measured separately from its satellite Charon during four HST/NICMOS observations in 1998, timed to sample four evenly spaced longitudes on Pluto. Being free of contamination by telluric absorptions or by Charon light, the new data are particularly valuable for studies of Pluto's continuum absorption. Previous studies of the major volatile species indicate the existence of at least three distinct terrains on Pluto's surface: N₂-rich, CH₄-rich, and volatile-depleted. The new data provide evidence that each of these three terrains has distinct near-infrared continuum absorption features. CH₄-rich regions appear to show reddish continuum absorption through the near-infrared spectral range. N₂-rich regions have very little continuum absorption. Visually dark, volatile-depleted regions exhibit intermediate continuum albedos with a bluish continuum slope. By analogy with Triton, we expected that careful spectral modeling would reveal strong evidence for the existence of H₂O ice on Pluto's surface, but we found only very weak evidence for its existence in the volatile-depleted regions. These data require H₂O ice to play a much less prominent role on Pluto's surface than it does on Triton's.     

External perturbations on distant planetary orbits and objects in the Kuiper disk

We investigate the potential importance of molecular cloud and stellar perturbations on the orbits of Pluto and more distant (hypothetical) planets up to 500 AU from the Sun. It is found that stellar and molecular cloud-core perturbations are of roughly equal importance. It also is found that the likelihood of substantial perturbations on Pluto is not insignificant, and that numerous substantial stellar and molecular cloud perturbations are likely to have influenced the orbits of any planets beyond 200 AU. These perturbations may contribute to a prevalence of moderate eccentricities and inclinations for planets beyond the orbit of Neptune, and may be a characteristic of distant planetary orbits in other solar systems. Given the recent discovery of chaotic behavior in Pluto's orbit (Sussman and Wisdom 1988), the effects of external perturbations on the long-term stability of Pluto's orbit warrant continued study.     

Seasonal Nitrogen Cycles on Pluto

A thermal model, developed to predict seasonal nitrogen cycles on Triton, has been modified and applied to Pluto. The model was used to calculate the partitioning of nitrogen between surface frost deposits and the atmosphere, as a function of time for various sets of input parameters. Volatile transport was confirmed to have a significant effect on Pluto's climate as nitrogen moved around on a seasonal time scale between hemispheres, and sublimed into and condensed out of the atmosphere. Pluto's high obliquity was found to have a significant effect on the distribution of frost on its surface. Conditions that would lead to permanent polar caps on Triton were found to lead to permanent zonal frost bands on Pluto. In some instances, frost sublimed from the middle of a seasonal cap outward, resulting in a “polar bald spot”. Frost which was darker than the substrate did not satisfy observables on Pluto, in contrast to our findings for Triton. Bright frost (brighter than the substrate) came closer to matching observables. Atmospheric pressure varied seasonally. The amplitudes, and to a lesser extent the phase, of the variation depended significantly on frost and substrate properties. Atmospheric pressure was found to be determined both by Pluto's distance from the sun and by the subsolar latitude. In most cases two peaks in atmospheric pressure were observed annually: a greater one associated with the sublimation of the north polar cap just as Pluto receded from perihelion, and a lesser one associated with the sublimation of the south polar cap as Pluto approached perihelion. Our model predicted frost-free dark substrate surface temperatures in the 50 to 60 K range, while frost temperatures typically ranged between 30 to 40 K. Temporal changes in frost coverage illustrated by our results, and changes in the viewing geometry of Pluto from the Earth, may be important for interpretation of ground-based measurements of Pluto's thermal emission.     

A fast,accurate, and smooth planetary ephemeris retrieval system

Precise trajectory simulations typically require an ephemeris retrieval system, i.e. some mechanism to identify planetary body states and orientations at given times. However, the ephemeris systems most commonly used throughout industry and academia are, by design, general in their capabilities and application. Here, we introduce a new system called FIRE (Fast Interpolated Runtime Ephemeris) that is designed for custom trajectory applications that favor speed and smooth derivatives. The new system minimizes the overhead associated with ephemeris calls through the use of archived splines, a runtime ephemeris (stored in random access memory of the computer), and batch processing routines. Further, our approach naturally provides first and second time derivatives for a small additional computational cost. The derivative capability is particularly attractive for optimization and targeting where smooth and accurate derivatives are important. Relative performance comparisons with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Spacecraft Planet Instrument C-matrix Events ephemeris system show typical speed improvements of approximately two orders of magnitude (250 times) for various state and orientation calls. Performance comparisons for high fidelity trajectory propagations are also considered and a factor of 70 in performance increase is achieved for typical cases. The new tool has potential value to any high precision application or software requiring fast, accurate, and smooth ephemeris data.     

SLR新星历及其在卫星预报中的应用

目前卫星激光测距(SLR)中所采用的IRV星历已经使用了近20年,近几年来随着对高轨卫星的测距和卫星白天测距的开展以及考虑到今后激光测距技术的发展,需要对SLR所采用的星历进行改进,以适应SLR发展的需求。从2006年8月起国际激光测距网(ILRS)将使用一种新的可用于多种目标测距的星历——CPF星历,该星历不仅可用于人造卫星的激光测距,而且还可用于月球及其转发器等目标的激光测距。该文介绍了这种SLR新星历和应用它进行卫星位置台站预报的情况,分析了其预报精度。     

Improvement of the numerical lunar ephemeris with laser ranging data

Analysis of lunar laser ranging data is underway at several institutions. We describe here our efforts at improving the numerical ephemeris of Moon, based on over three years' span of data. Orbit generation and correction procedures are discussed briefly. Comparisons of the new ephemeris with observations and with a widely available ephemeris are illustrated. The standard deviation of the observation residuals is 7 m.Communication presented at the conference on Lunar Dynamics and Observational Coordinate Systems held January 15–17, 1973 at the Lunar Science Institute, Houston, Tex., U.S.A.     

The mystery of Pluto's mass

After a short presentation of the Pluto-Charon system and the history of its mass determinations some first reasons are presented that support the existence of a ring of billions of small satellites about Pluto up to tenths of millions of kilometers.The stability, the shape and the dimensions of such an heavy ring are discussed.Finally a general review of advantages and drawbacks of this ring theory is presented as well as the possibilities of detection of the eventual Pluto's ring.     

Tidal evolution and the Pluto-Charon system

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 synchronism which has been suggested by the available data, is found to represent the stable end-product of the evolution. The time needed for the synchronization is shown to be less than the age of the solar system, provided that Pluto's tidal dissipation function is smaller than 10⁴–10⁵. Moreover, the initial orbital radius of the system could not be largerthan two or three times the present radius, so that Charon has been always a close satellite.Finally, we discuss Lyttleton's hypothesis that Pluto is an escaped satellite of Neptune, suggesting that a possible mechanism of Pluto's ejection could be connected with a retrograde capture of Triton by Neptune or with the subsequent tidal evolution of Triton's orbit.     

Russian lunar ephemeris EPM-ERA 2012

The paper describes the lunar ephemeris EPM-ERA 2012. It is a part of the Ephemerides of Planets and the Moon (EPM) developed at the Institute of Applied Astronomy (IAA) of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS). In order to construct EPM-ERA 2012, 17580 lunar laser ranging (LLR) observations for 1970–2012 have been processed including 21 observations from the Lunokhod 1 reflector found by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) at the end of 2010. EPM-ERA 2012 is compared with American ephemerides DE403, DE405, DE421 ephemeris, and the French ephemeris INPOP10. The possibility of the use of the ephemeris EPM-ERA 2012 to address contemporary problems of ephemeris astronomy is considered.     

光压摄动计算中地影间断的处理

人卫精密定轨中受摄星历（或称精密星历,即状态转移）,可由分析解或数值解提供,相应的定轨方法亦有分析法定轨与数值法定轨之称。对于后者,在一般情况下,现有的常微分方程数值解法（或称积分器）已能满足精度要求,除长弧定轨外,有一定问题是值得注意的,即地影“间断”问题的处理,这关系到如何在保证星历精度的前提下提高计算效率的问题。本文针对这一问题,给出了相应的改进算法,并通过数值验证表明算法的有效性。     

Ephemeris of a highly eccentric orbit: Explorer 28

An ephemeris has been obtained for Explorer 28 (IMP 3) which agrees well with 2 years of radio observations and with SAO observations a year later. This ephemeris is generated over the 3 year lifetime by a numerical integration method utilizing a set of initial conditions, at launch and without requiring further differential correction. Because highly eccentric orbits are difficult to compute with acceptable accuracy and because a long continuous arc has been obtained which compares with actual data to a known precision, this ephemeris may be used as a standard for computing highly eccentric orbits in the Earth-Moon system.Orbit improvement was used to obtain the initial conditions which generated the ephemeris. This improvement was based on correcting the energy by adjusting the semimajor axis to match computed times of perigee passage with the observed. This procedure may generate errors in semimajor axis to compensate for model errors in the energy; however this compensation error is also implicit in orbit determination itself.     

Precision of the ephemerides of outer planetary satellites

Ephemerides of planetary satellites are needed to address many problems. These ephemerides are used for subsequent observations. A comparison of the available ephemerides with new observations allows the accuracy of the former to be assessed. However, the precision of the ephemerides must be known a priori when solving the tasks. In this paper we formulate and solve the problem of estimating the precision of the ephemerides of outer planetary satellites derived from observations when applied up to the future moments.The methods of assessing the precision of ephemerides involve producing a set of samples of the same ephemeris inferred from observations with different samples of Monte Carlo generated random errors (RO) superimposed onto it. The statistical parameters of simulated observational errors are based on the results of the reduction of real satellite observations. We compute the deviations of the samples of the ephemeris from the standard ephemeris inferred from real observations and adopt the root-mean-square deviation of the apparent coordinates as the precision of the ephemeris. We also use alternative methods: one based on the matrix of covariances of parameter errors (RP), and another one based on bootstrap samples of observations (BS).We use three methods (RO, RP, and BS) to estimate the precision of the ephemerides of all the 107 outer planetary satellites over the 2010-2020 time interval. The precision of the ephemerides of different satellites varies from 0.05 to 4.0 arcsec. For a number of satellites new observations are of vital importance for maintaining the precision of the ephemerides at a level that would allow identification of satellites during the reduction of observations. For some satellites the precision of their ephemerides is of the order of the sizes of their orbits and such satellites can be considered to have been lost. We show that the method of bootstrap samples (BS) can give doubtful results in the cases where there are few observations, which covered a time interval that is shorter than the orbital period of the satellite.Our results suggest obtaining more precise ephemeris making new observations at the times of maximum estimated errors of the ephemeris.All the inferred estimates of the precision of ephemerides are available from the MULTI-SAT ephemeris server: www.imcce.fr/sat (IMCCE), www.sai.msu.ru/neb/nss/index.htm (SAI).     

基于Web Services的星历计算服务平台设计及其实现

为克服复杂耗时的星历计算,基于兼备计算精度高、时间跨度长、内容丰富等优点的Swiss Ephemeris星历计算程序包,利用JNI和Web Service等新兴的技术,我们设计出了一套面向星历研究人员和天文程序开发人员的星历计算服务平台——China-VO Ephemeris WS,并且以日食带的中心食带绘制为例,具体介绍了China-VO Ephemeris WS的功能和使用。     

Transneptunian Object Ephemeris Service (TNOEPH)

We present a web service called TNOEPH ( http://asteroid.lowell.edu/)for ephemeris uncertainty prediction and dynamical classification ofshort-arc trans\-neptunian objects (TNOs). User-supplied observations are transformed to a rigorous sky-plane uncertainty map using the technique of statistical orbital ranging. We show examples of thegrowth of ephemeris uncertainty with time, and give the probabilities ofdifferent dynamical classifications for a few short-arc TNOs.     

利用IGS星历预报GPS卫星轨道

在动力学轨道拟合以及轨道积分的基础上,提出了基于IGS精密星历的GPS卫星轨道预报方法。该方法首先利用已知的IGS精密星历作为虚拟观测值,采用动力学方法拟合出GPS卫星的初始轨道和动力学参数,然后再通过积分来预报GPS卫星的轨道。主要讨论了基于不同弧段的IGS星历时,该方法对GPS卫星轨道的拟合和预报情况。研究结果显示:对于6 d弧段以内的IGS精密星历,其拟合轨道与IGS精密星历差值的三维RMS值均优于4 cm,随着拟合弧段的增加,拟合残差变大;当利用2～6 d弧段的IGS星历来预报GPS轨道时,大部分卫星第1天、第7天和第30天的三维预报精度可优于0.1 m、3 m和100 m。其中,2d弧段的IGS星历对GPS卫星第1天和第7天的预报结果最好,5 d弧段的IGS星历对GPS卫星第30天的预报结果最好。     

Principal algorithms for the control of Kourovka Observatory SBG camera

We report the algorithms used in the software of the upgraded SBG camera. Fast-moving satellites are observed in the “rotated” coordinate system where one of the axes points towards the pole of the object’s orbit. The ephemeris for this coordinate system is computed based on the ephemeris for the equatorial coordinate system using special transition matrices. The parameters of the matrices are the coordinates of the orbital pole, which are found by averaging the vector products of the radius vectors of the consecutive positions of the satellite. The position angle of the image is computed as the difference between the hour angles of the orbital and celestial poles in the coordinate system, the pole of which coincides with the optical center of the frame. The speed of object tracking is computed via quadratic interpolation of the ephemeris in the “rotated” coordinate system.     

Validity of the Relations Between the Synodic and Sidereal Rotation Velocities of the Sun

Existing methods for conversion between synodic and sidereal rotation velocities of the Sun are tested for validity using state-of-the-art ephemeris data. We found that some of them agree well with ephemeris calculations while others show a discrepancy of almost 0.01^° day^?1. This discrepancy is attributed to a missing factor and a new corrected relation is given.     

Ephemerides of Asteroid Satellites and Estimation of Their Accuracy

Solar System Research - The article presents new results on motion modeling and creation of ephemeris of satellites of asteroids based on observations. In previous work on the project, ephemeris of...     

On the orientation of ephemeris reference frames

One may construct complete planetary and lunar ephemerides, referred to the equator and dynamical equinox of some epoch, strictly from ranging data alone. Such an ephemeris would be completely independent from any optical data and therefore independent of any stellar catalogue. By using such an ephemeris to then analyse optical observations, one could theoretically derive many of the pertinent features of the catalogue system to which the optical observations are referred. Such features include the equinox offset, equinox motion and systematic proper motion errors. In practice, the optical observations are used in the fitting process, but essentially the same determinations may be made.This paper presents estimates of the equinox offset and equinox motion of the FK4 as determined by the ephemeris fitting process and compares them with corresponding determinations by Fricke. No significant differences are found. Further, it is indicated how one may also estimate a value for precession and the value of the obliquity from the ephemerides. These' values are also compared with the presently adopted ones.