Bibcode
Moreno, F.; Licandro, J.; Cabrera-Lavers, A.; Pozuelos, F. J.
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 826, Issue 2, article id. 137, 6 pp. (2016).
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8
2016
Journal
Citations
18
Refereed citations
17
Description
We present observations and dust tail models of activated asteroid
P/2015 X6 from deep imaging data acquired at the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio
Canarias (GTC) from 2015 mid-December to 2016 late January. The results
of the modeling indicate that the asteroid has undergone sustained dust
loss over a period of two months or longer. The dust parameters, derived
from multidimensional fits of the available images, are compatible with
either ice sublimation or rotational instability processes. An impulsive
event, as might be associated with an impact with another body, is less
likely. A power-law distribution of particles, with minimum and maximum
radii of 1 μm and 1 cm and a power index of ‑3.3, is found to
be consistent with the observations. Depending on the model of ejection
velocity adopted, the particle velocities are found to be in the range
of 0.3–10 m s‑1. The activation time was between
18 and 26 days before discovery. The total mass ejected from that time
to the most recent observation is in the range 5–9 ×
106 kg. No dust features giving indication of past activity
earlier than the activation time have been observed.