Journal
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
Volume 11, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
NATURE PORTFOLIO
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16433-z
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Funding
- NASA through the New Frontiers Program [NNM10AA11C]
- JSPS International Planetary Network
- French space agency CNES
- Academies of Excellence: Complex systems and Space, environment, risk, and resilience, part of the IDEX JEDI of the Universite Cote d'Azur
- European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program [870377]
- NASA [NNH12ZDA001N, NNH17ZDA001N]
- Johns Hopkins University
- University of Maryland
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Asteroid shapes and hydration levels can serve as tracers of their history and origin. For instance, the asteroids (162173) Ryugu and (101955) Bennu have an oblate spheroidal shape with a pronounced equator, but contain different surface hydration levels. Here we show, through numerical simulations of large asteroid disruptions, that oblate spheroids, some of which have a pronounced equator defining a spinning top shape, can form directly through gravitational reaccumulation. We further show that rubble piles formed in a single disruption can have similar porosities but variable degrees of hydration. The direct formation of top shapes from single disruption alone can explain the relatively old crater-retention ages of the equatorial features of Ryugu and Bennu. Two separate parent-body disruptions are not necessarily required to explain their different hydration levels. Asteroid shapes and hydration levels can serve as tracers of their history and origin. Here, the authors show top shape asteroids can form directly through gravitational reaccumulation and rubble piles formed in a single disruption can have similar porosities but variable degrees of hydration.
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