Abstract
THE population of asteroids that cross the Earth's orbit is responsible for most of the terrestrial impacts of kilometre-size objects, of which there may be several per million years1. About 150 Earth-crossing asteroids are known, although many more are thought to exist2. Asteroids that come close to the Earth's orbit, but do not currently cross it, may also pose a threat if they evolve onto Earth-crossing orbits. The asteroid 433 Eros, with a dia-meter of ∼22 km and a perihelion of 1.13 AU (where 1 AU is the average distance of the Earth from the Sun), is the second-largest near-Earth asteroid3. Here we report a study of the dynamical evolution of Eros's orbit over a period of two million years. We identify an orbital resonance with Mars that has the potential to perturb Mars-crossing asteroids, such as Eros, onto Earth-crossing orbits; of eight trial orbits that closely match Eros's present orbital parameters, three become Earth-crossing on the timescale of our simulations, and one of these hits the Earth after 1.14 Myr. Although our simulations indicate no significant danger of a catastrophic impact by this large near-Earth asteroid during the next ∼105 years, such a collision is likely in the far future.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 51 print issues and online access
$199.00 per year
only $3.90 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bottke, W. F., Nolan, M. C., Greenberg, R. & Kolvoord, R. A. in Hazards due to Comets and Asteroids (ed. Gehrels, T.) 337–358 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1994).
Rabinowitz, D., Bowell, E., Shoemaker, E. & Muinonen, K. in Hazards due to Comets and Asteroids (ed. Gehrels, T.) 285–312 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1994).
McFadden, L.-A., Tholen, D. J. & Veeder, G. J. in Asteroids II (eds. Binzel, R. P., Gehrels, T. & Matthews, M. S.) 442–467 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1989).
Milani, A., Carpino, M., Hahn, G. & Nobili, A. M. Icarus 78, 212–269 (1989).
Chapman, C. R. & Morrison, D. Nature 367, 33–40 (1994).
Adushkin, V. V. & Nemchinov, I. V. in Hazards due to Comets and Asteroids (ed. Gehrels, T.) 721–778 (Univ. Arizona Press, Tucson, 1994).
Alvarez, L., Alvarez, W., Asaro, F. & Michel, H. V. Science 208, 1095–1108 (1980).
Swisher, C. C. et al. Science 257, 954–958 (1992).
Whipple, A. L. Icarus 115, 347–353 (1995).
Tancredi, G. Ast. Astrophys. 299, 288–292 (1995).
Stoer, J. & Bulirsch, R. Introduction to Numerical Analysis (Springer, New York 1980).
Michel, P., Froeschlé, Ch. & Farinella, P. Astr. Astrophys. (in the press).
Froeschlé, Ch., Hahn, G., Gonczi, R., Morbidelli, A. & Farinella, P. Icarus 117, 45–61 (1995).
Farquhar, R. W., Dunham, D. W. & McAdams, J. V. paper AAS 95-378, presented at AAS/AIAA Conference, Halifax, Canada, 14–17 August (1995).
Chapman, C. R. Lunar Planet. Sci. XXVI, 229–230 (1995).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Michel, P., Farinella, P. & Froeschlé, C. The orbital evolution of the asteroid Eros and implications for collision with the Earth . Nature 380, 689–691 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1038/380689a0
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/380689a0
This article is cited by
-
Shapes, structures, and evolution of small bodies
Astrodynamics (2021)
-
Dynamical transport to planet crossing orbits
Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy (1997)
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.