35th Meeting of the AAS Division on Dynamical Astronomy, April 2004
Session 1 Extra-solar Planets
Oral, Tuesday, April 20, 2004, 9:30am-12:45pm,

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[1.03] The Dynamics of Two Planets on Inclined Orbits

D. Veras, P.J. Armitage (University of Colorado at Boulder)

We explore the dynamics of two planets on inclined orbits through both analytical techniques and extensive numerical scattering experiments, and show that significant radial migration occurs predominantly by 2:1 and 5:3 mean motion resonant interactions. We derive a criterion for two equal mass planets on circular inclined orbits to achieve Hill stability, and relate that criterion to the eccentric case. Using Laplace-Lagrange secular theory, we obtain analytical secular solutions for the orbital inclinations and longitudes of ascending nodes, and use those solutions to distinguish between the secular and resonant dynamics which arise from the numerical simulations. Our ~104 numerical simulations were performed with the Burlisch-Stoer integrator included with the HNbody package, and were run with a fine semimajor axis grid size on the order of ~ 0.01 AU. We also illustrate how encounter maps, typically used to trace the motion of massless particles, may be modified to reproduce the gross instability seen by the numerical integrations. Such a correlation suggests promising future use of such maps to model the dynamics of massive planets.


The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: dimitri.veras@colorado.edu

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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 36 #2
© 2004. The American Astronomical Soceity.