The Hubble Wide Field Camera 3 Test of Surfaces in the Outer Solar System: Spectral Variation on Kuiper Belt Objects

TL;DR

This study reanalyzed Hubble WFC3 data of Kuiper Belt Objects, revealing spectral variations on five targets and supporting the idea that the neutral class is a single broad spectral class.

Contribution

It provides new photometric data and reanalysis confirming spectral variability and clarifying the classification of Kuiper Belt Object surfaces.

Findings

Spectral variations detected on 5 targets not due to errors.

Optical and NIR color distributions show two broad classes.

Neutral class likely represents a single broad spectral class.

Abstract

Here we present additional photometry of targets observed as part of the Hubble Wide Field Camera 3 Test of Surfaces in the Outer Solar System. 12 targets were re-observed with the Wide Field Camera 3 in optical and NIR wavebands designed to compliment those used during the first visit. Additionally, all observations originally presented by Fraser and Brown (2012) were reanalyzed through the same updated photometry pipeline. A reanalysis of the optical and NIR colour distribution reveals a bifurcated optical colour distribution and only two identifiable spectral classes, each of which occupies a broad range of colours and have correlated optical and NIR colours, in agreement with our previous findings. We report the detection of significant spectral variations on 5 targets which cannot be attributed to photometry errors, cosmic rays, point spread function or sensitivity variations, or other image artifacts capable of explaining the magnitude of the variation. The spectrally variable objects are found to have a broad range of dynamical classes, absolute magnitudes, exhibit a broad range of apparent magnitude variations, and are found in both compositional classes. The spectrally variable objects with sufficiently accurate colours for spectral classification maintain their membership, belonging to the same class at both epochs. 2005 TV189 exhibits a sufficiently broad difference in colour at the two epochs that span the full range of colours of the neutral class. This strongly argues that the neutral class is one single class with a broad range of colours, rather than the combination of multiple overlapping classes.