Initial energy and perihelion distributions of Oort-cloud cometsA Monte Carlo model of stellar perturbations of the Oort cloud is used to study the distributions in energy and perihelion of comets entering the planetary region for the first time. The model is run for a variety of initial states and a range of velocity perturbations. In all cases the resulting orbits are uniformly distributed in perihelion distance in the planetary region, q less than 20 AU. Most orbits are confined to a fairly narrow range in 1/a and hyperbolic orbits are rare.
Document ID
19780035854
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Proceedings
Authors
Weissman, P. R. (California, University Los Angeles, Calif., United States)