No, NASA’s DART asteroid impact won’t cause a meteor shower on Earth. But it might on Mars.

Astronomers have concluded that debris from the collision between asteroid Dimorpho and NASA’s DART spacecraft could reach Earth and Mars. However, while the debris could cause meteors to fall on Mars, it is unlikely that meteors would be visible from Earth.

DART, Double Asteroid Diversion Test I ran into Dimorpho On September 26, 2022, with the intention of testing whether a kinetic energy shock could one day push a potentially hazardous asteroid out of orbit near Earth. The test passed with flying colors. Dimorphos be pushed to a shorter orbit Around the asteroid Didymos(Neither Dimorphos nor Didymos ever posed a threat to our planet. They were merely test subjects for this experiment.)

The impact that dented Dimorphos’ crater also ejected a large amount of debris, which formed a cone of escaping material that the little man observed up close. CubeSat called ~ Lisia Cube (Light Italian Cubesat for Imaging of Asteroids) accompanied DART to observe the aftermath of the impact. In particular, LICIACube observed particles larger than a micron (one-millionth of a meter) being ejected at speeds of up to 500 meters (1,640 feet) per second.

Meanwhile, the Large Array of Astronomical Telescopes (LAST) and the 28-inch telescope at the Wise Observatory in Israel, and NASA swift The satellite’s ultraviolet and optical telescopes suggested that additional fine particles were emitted, traveling at much faster speeds: 1,400 to 1,800 meters (about 5,000 to 5,900 feet) per second.

relevant: NASA’s DART Asteroid Impact Completely Destroys Space Rock Target

The team led by Eloy Peña-Asensio of the Politecnico di Milano in Italy and Michael Küppers, a project scientist at the European Space Agency Hera The DART follow-up mission, scheduled to launch toward Didymos and Dimorphos in October, has now modeled how the debris might spread inside. Solar system. The team’s calculations are based on how gravity works on Didymos and Dimorphos. sun, mercury, VenusEarth, Mars, Jupiter furthermore moonEverything affects the trajectory of the debris.

Their main simulation modeled 3 million particles, divided into size groups of 10 centimeters (3.9 inches), 0.5 centimeters (0.2 inches), and 30 microns, moving at speeds of up to 500 meters (1,640 feet) per second, based on observations from LICIACube.

Post-DART impact image of Dimorpho, as seen by the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescopes. (Image credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI)

“Our results show that, given the geometry of the ejecta cone and the observed peak ejecta rate, there is a plausible path for this material to reach Mars,” Peña-Asensio told Space.com. “That’s the most definitive conclusion we’ve ever made.”

A second simulation was modeled around the higher emission rates suggested by Swift and ground-based observatories.

“For the second simulation, these fast ejecta are expected to consist primarily of submicron particles that do not produce meteoroids as they penetrate the atmosphere.”

Crucially, the main simulations showed that the slower particles could reach Mars within 13 years of the DART impact, that is, by 2035. The delivery to the Red Planet is aided by the fact that the orbit of the Didymos-Dimorphos binary around the Sun crosses the orbit of Mars, meaning that the ejecta would not have to travel as fast or as far to reach Mars as they would to reach Earth. In fact, the main simulations showed that none of these slower particles would ever reach Earth.

But the second simulation is a different story. It means that the fast-moving particles could reach Mars within five years of the DART impact, and reach Earth seven years after the impact. However, the particles that reach Earth are too small to form a visible meteor shower. This would require larger particles to sneak in somehow.

“In our primary simulation, no particles reach Earth at speeds below 1,000 meters per second (3,280 feet per second),” Peña-Asensio said. “Only particles emitted at speeds above 1,500 meters per second (4,900 feet per second) reach Earth, and that only happens in the secondary simulation.”

“However,” the researchers added, “if the particle was slightly larger, or if LICIACube missed the macroscopic particle at this speed, it could have reached Earth and produced an observable meteor. Only future meteor-observing campaigns will be able to confirm this.”

The simulations were also able to show where the debris that would reach Earth and Mars would come from. The debris that would create a meteor shower on Mars in 2035 would come from the north of the impact site, while the smaller, faster-moving particles that would reach Earth would come from the southwest of the resulting crater.

“Impacts like DART and the resulting ejecta highlight the ongoing exchange of material between planetary bodies and asteroids. comet And the same goes for other celestial bodies,” Peña-Asensio concluded.

So, Earth’s skies won’t be lit up by meteor showers from Dimorphos debris, Mars Rover The next decade may see a meteor shower.

The study is presented as follows: Preprint It is stored in the paper repository at arXiv.

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