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The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future

Received: 10 July 2017     Accepted: 25 July 2017     Published: 25 August 2017
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Abstract

A review and discussion of both the historical and contemporaneous ideas pertaining to the putative population of Vulcanoid asteroids is presented. Current observations indicate that no objects larger than between 5 to 10 km in diameter reside in the orbital stability zone between 0.06 and 0.2 AU from the Sun, and that, at best, only a small population of Vulcanoid asteroids might exist at the present epoch. We review the physical processes (sublimation mass loss, evolution of the Sun’s luminosity, Poynting-Robertson drag, the Yarkovsky effect, the YORP effect, unipolar heating and collisions) that will control the lifetime against destruction of objects, either primordial or present-day, that chance to reside in the Vulcanoid region. It is argued that there are no overriding and/or absolute physical mechanisms that fully rule-out the present-day existence of a small Vulcanoid population, but we note that the gap between what the observations allow and what the theoretical models deem possible is closing rapidly.

Published in American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics (Volume 5, Issue 3)
DOI 10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12
Page(s) 28-41
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2017. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Vulcanoid Asteroids, Orbital Evolution, Thermal Processing, Detection Methods

References
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  • APA Style

    Martin Beech, Lowell Peltier. (2017). The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future. American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 5(3), 28-41. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12

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    ACS Style

    Martin Beech; Lowell Peltier. The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future. Am. J. Astron. Astrophys. 2017, 5(3), 28-41. doi: 10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12

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    AMA Style

    Martin Beech, Lowell Peltier. The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future. Am J Astron Astrophys. 2017;5(3):28-41. doi: 10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12,
      author = {Martin Beech and Lowell Peltier},
      title = {The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future},
      journal = {American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics},
      volume = {5},
      number = {3},
      pages = {28-41},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajaa.20170503.12},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajaa.20170503.12},
      abstract = {A review and discussion of both the historical and contemporaneous ideas pertaining to the putative population of Vulcanoid asteroids is presented. Current observations indicate that no objects larger than between 5 to 10 km in diameter reside in the orbital stability zone between 0.06 and 0.2 AU from the Sun, and that, at best, only a small population of Vulcanoid asteroids might exist at the present epoch. We review the physical processes (sublimation mass loss, evolution of the Sun’s luminosity, Poynting-Robertson drag, the Yarkovsky effect, the YORP effect, unipolar heating and collisions) that will control the lifetime against destruction of objects, either primordial or present-day, that chance to reside in the Vulcanoid region. It is argued that there are no overriding and/or absolute physical mechanisms that fully rule-out the present-day existence of a small Vulcanoid population, but we note that the gap between what the observations allow and what the theoretical models deem possible is closing rapidly.},
     year = {2017}
    }
    

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    T1  - The Vulcanoid Asteroids: Past, Present and Future
    AU  - Martin Beech
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    T2  - American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics
    JF  - American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics
    JO  - American Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics
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    AB  - A review and discussion of both the historical and contemporaneous ideas pertaining to the putative population of Vulcanoid asteroids is presented. Current observations indicate that no objects larger than between 5 to 10 km in diameter reside in the orbital stability zone between 0.06 and 0.2 AU from the Sun, and that, at best, only a small population of Vulcanoid asteroids might exist at the present epoch. We review the physical processes (sublimation mass loss, evolution of the Sun’s luminosity, Poynting-Robertson drag, the Yarkovsky effect, the YORP effect, unipolar heating and collisions) that will control the lifetime against destruction of objects, either primordial or present-day, that chance to reside in the Vulcanoid region. It is argued that there are no overriding and/or absolute physical mechanisms that fully rule-out the present-day existence of a small Vulcanoid population, but we note that the gap between what the observations allow and what the theoretical models deem possible is closing rapidly.
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Author Information
  • Campion College, The University of Regina, Regina, Canada

  • Department of Physics, The University of Regina, Regina, Canada

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