Lucchetti, A; Cambioni, S; Nakano, R; Barnouin, O S; Pajola, M; Penasa, L; Tusberti, F; Ramesh, K T; Dotto, E; Ernst, C M; Daly, R T; Mazzotta Epifani, E; Hirabayashi, M; Parro, L; Poggiali, G; Campo Bagatin, A; Ballouz, R-L; Chabot, N L; Michel, P; Murdoch, N; ... (2024). Fast boulder fracturing by thermal fatigue detected on stony asteroids. Nature Communications, 15(1), p. 6206. Springer Nature 10.1038/s41467-024-50145-y
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Spacecraft observations revealed that rocks on carbonaceous asteroids, which constitute the most numerous class by composition, can develop millimeter-to-meter-scale fractures due to thermal stresses. However, signatures of this process on the second-most populous group of asteroids, the S-complex, have been poorly constrained. Here, we report observations of boulders' fractures on Dimorphos, which is the moonlet of the S-complex asteroid (65803) Didymos, the target of NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) planetary defense mission. We show that the size-frequency distribution and orientation of the mapped fractures are consistent with formation through thermal fatigue. The fractures' preferential orientation supports that these have originated in situ on Dimorphos boulders and not on Didymos boulders later transferred to Dimorphos. Based on our model of the fracture propagation, we propose that thermal fatigue on rocks exposed on the surface of S-type asteroids can form shallow, horizontally propagating fractures in much shorter timescales (100 kyr) than in the direction normal to the boulder surface (order of Myrs). The presence of boulder fields affected by thermal fracturing on near-Earth asteroid surfaces may contribute to an enhancement in the ejected mass and momentum from kinetic impactors when deflecting asteroids.
Item Type: |
Journal Article (Original Article) |
|---|---|
Division/Institute: |
08 Faculty of Science > Physics Institute > Space Research and Planetary Sciences 08 Faculty of Science > Physics Institute |
UniBE Contributor: |
Raducan, Sabina-Denisa |
Subjects: |
500 Science > 530 Physics 500 Science > 520 Astronomy 600 Technology > 620 Engineering |
ISSN: |
2041-1723 |
Publisher: |
Springer Nature |
Language: |
English |
Submitter: |
Pubmed Import |
Date Deposited: |
31 Jul 2024 17:02 |
Last Modified: |
31 Jul 2024 17:11 |
Publisher DOI: |
10.1038/s41467-024-50145-y |
PubMed ID: |
39080275 |
BORIS DOI: |
10.48350/199407 |
URI: |
https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/199407 |
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