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Size and albedo of Kuiper belt object 55636 from a stellar occultation

Naturevolume 465, pages897–900 (2010)Cite this article

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Abstract

The Kuiper belt is a collection of small bodies (Kuiper belt objects, KBOs) that lie beyond the orbit of Neptune and which are believed to have formed contemporaneously with the planets. Their small size and great distance make them difficult to study. KBO 55636 (2002 TX300) is a member of the water-ice-rich Haumea KBO collisional family1. The Haumea family are among the most highly reflective objects in the Solar System. Dynamical calculations indicate that the collision that created KBO 55636 occurred at least 1 Gyr ago2,3. Here we report observations of a multi-chord stellar occultation by KBO 55636, which occurred on 9 October 2009ut. We find that it has a mean radius of 143 ± 5 km (assuming a circular solution). Allowing for possible elliptical shapes, we find a geometric albedo of in the V photometric band, which establishes that KBO 55636 is smaller than previously thought and that, like its parent body, it is highly reflective. The dynamical age implies either that KBO 55636 has an active resurfacing mechanism, or that fresh water-ice in the outer Solar System can persist for gigayear timescales.

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Figure 1:Light curves for KBO 55636.
Figure 2:Occultation chords and the radius of KBO 55636.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to W. M. Grundy for supplyingHV magnitudes from his database and for discussions of water-ice surfaces in the outer Solar System; to W. B. McKinnon for discussions of the physical state of water-ice at low temperatures; to E. D. Schmidt for use of the telescope and participating in the observations at Behlen Observatory; to B. Carter for help in obtaining telescope time at Mt Kent, and to L. A. Young for assisting with the McDonald observations. We thank D. Byrne of the Visitor Information Station at the Onizuka Center for International Astronomy on Mauna Kea for use of their equipment and facilitating the observations from their site. J.W. thanks E. Gates of Lick Observatory, and E. Becklin, E. Pfueller, M. Wiedemann and M. Burgdort of SOFIA, for support of his observations. B. Sicardy provided several comments that improved the paper. Occultation research at MIT and Williams College is supported by NASA and NSF.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA,

    J. L. Elliot, M. J. Person, C. A. Zuluaga, A. S. Bosh, E. R. Adams, T. C. Brothers, A. A. S. Gulbis, S. E. Levine, M. Lockhart & A. M. Zangari

  2. Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA,

    J. L. Elliot

  3. Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, Arizona 86001, USA ,

    J. L. Elliot, L. Bright & E. W. Dunham

  4. Southern Africa Large Telescope and South African Astronomical Observatory, PO Box 9, 8935, Cape Town, South Africa ,

    A. A. S. Gulbis

  5. United States Naval Observatory (USNO), Flagstaff, Arizona 86001, USA ,

    S. E. Levine & T. Tilleman

  6. American Association of Variable Star Observers, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA ,

    S. E. Levine

  7. Physics Department, Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts 01267, USA,

    B. A. Babcock

  8. Astronomy Department, Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts 01267, USA,

    K. DuPré, J. M. Pasachoff & S. P. Souza

  9. Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network, Santa Barbara, California 93117, USA ,

    W. Rosing

  10. University of Hawai’i, Hilo, Hawai’i 96720-4091, USA ,

    N. Secrest

  11. Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington DC 20015, USA

    S. S. Sheppard

  12. Department of Geology, University of Hawai’i, Leeward Community College, Pearl City, Hawai’i 96782, USA,

    M. Kakkala

  13. Amateur Telescope Makers of Boston, Westford, Massachusetts 01886, USA ,

    B. Berger, J. W. Briggs, G. Jacobson, P. Valleli & B. Volz

  14. Dexter-Southfield Schools, Brookline, Massachusetts 02145, USA ,

    J. W. Briggs

  15. Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mt Stromlo Observatory, Weston Creek, Australian Capital Territory 2611, Australia ,

    S. Rapoport

  16. Mt Kent Observatory, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland 4350, Australia ,

    R. Hart

  17. Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska 68588, USA,

    M. Brucker

  18. Instituto de Astronomía, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Apartado Postal 877, 22800 Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico ,

    R. Michel

  19. IBM, St Leonards, New South Wales 2065, Australia ,

    A. Mattingly

  20. Nompuewenu Observatory, University of Texas Brownsville/Texas Southmost College, Brownsville, Texas 78520, USA ,

    L. Zambrano-Marin

  21. SOFIA, Universities Space Research Association, NASA Ames, Moffett Field, California 94035, USA ,

    A. W. Meyer

  22. SOFIA, Deutsches SOFIA Institute, NASA Ames, Moffett Field, California 94035, USA ,

    J. Wolf

  23. Magdalena Ridge Observatory, New Mexico Tech, Socorro, New Mexico 87801, USA ,

    E. V. Ryan & W. H. Ryan

  24. Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064, USA,

    K. Morzinski & B. Grigsby

  25. James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland 4870, Australia ,

    J. Brimacombe

  26. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA ,

    D. Ragozzine

  27. Observatorio Astronómico, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Nicaragua, Managua, Nicaragua

    H. G. Montano

  28. Mt John University Observatory, Lake Tekapo 7945, New Zealand

    A. Gilmore

Authors
  1. J. L. Elliot

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  2. M. J. Person

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  3. C. A. Zuluaga

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  33. A. W. Meyer

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  39. J. Brimacombe

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  40. D. Ragozzine

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  42. A. Gilmore

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Contributions

J.L.E. helped plan the observations, consulted on the occultation prediction, analysed the data, and wrote the paper. M.J.P. organized the observers, performed observations from Brownsville, Texas, and consulted on the prediction, data reduction, text and figures. C.A.Z. analysed the data for the stellar occultation prediction and constructed the light curves. A.S.B. directed the data analysis for the occultation prediction. E.R.A. wrote the light-curve generation software. S.E.L. made astrometric observations and performed observations of the occultation from the USNO in Flagstaff. M.L. designed and built 12 PICO camera systems and attempted observations from Cairns. J.M.P. arranged for observations at several sites and helped to plan the observations. S.P.S. consulted on the design of the PICO. L.B., E.W.D., S.S.S. and T.T. supplied astrometric data for the occultation prediction. D.R. provided information used to derive the geometric albedo of KBO 55636. Authors identified inSupplementary Table 2 were responsible for the observations. All authors were given the opportunity to review the results and comment on the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence toJ. L. Elliot.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

This file contains Supplementary Information and Data, Supplementary Tables 1-5, Supplementary Figures 1-3 with legends and References. (PDF 1244 kb)

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Elliot, J., Person, M., Zuluaga, C.et al. Size and albedo of Kuiper belt object 55636 from a stellar occultation.Nature465, 897–900 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature09109

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Editorial Summary

A second look at KBO 55636

Kuiper belt objects (KBOs), small icy bodies orbiting in the Solar System beyond Neptune, are difficult observational targets. Occasionally one is spotted causing a stellar occultation, when data relevant to its structure can be obtained and a few properties deduced. But the stellar occultation of 9 October 2009, involving KBO 55636, a member of the water-ice rich Haumea collisional family, was a landmark event taking the observational astronomy of KBOs to a new level. Following several years of tracking of bright KBOs, it was possible to predict an imminent occultation, and to train a number of telescopes in its direction. Despite the vagaries of weather and other observational hazards, more than one (in fact two) separate telescopes were able to make the observation. With two different angles of view to work with, more accurate figures can be calculated: KBO 55636's mean radius of 143 ± 5 km, and its geometric albedo of about 0.9 in the V band, reveal it to be smaller than previously thought and, like its parent body, highly reflective. The dynamical age implies either that KBO 55636 has an active resurfacing mechanism, or that fresh water ice can persist for billions of years in the outer reaches of the Solar System.

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