Tilting Jupiter (a bit) and Saturn (a lot) During Planetary Migration

TL;DR

This study investigates how late planetary migration influenced the obliquities of Jupiter and Saturn, suggesting resonant crossings during migration shaped their current axial tilts, with implications for early Solar System dynamics.

Contribution

It demonstrates that Jupiter's and Saturn's obliquities were likely excited by crossing specific spin-orbit resonances during planetary migration, providing constraints on migration history.

Findings

Jupiter's obliquity may result from crossing the s8 resonance.

Saturn's large obliquity likely due to capture into the s8 resonance.

Resonance crossing constrains early planetary migration models.

Abstract

We study the effects of planetary late migration on the gas giants obliquities. We consider the planetary instability models from Nesvorny & Morbidelli (2012), in which the obliquities of Jupiter and Saturn can be excited when the spin-orbit resonances occur. The most notable resonances occur when the $s_7$ and $s_8$ frequencies, changing as a result of planetary migration, become commensurate with the precession frequencies of Jupiter's and Saturn's spin vectors. We show that Jupiter may have obtained its present obliquity by crossing of the $s_8$ resonance. This would set strict constrains on the character of migration during the early stage. Additional effects on Jupiter's obliquity are expected during the last gasp of migration when the $s_7$ resonance was approached. The magnitude of these effects depends on the precise value of the Jupiter's precession constant. Saturn's large obliquity was likely excited by capture into the $s_8$ resonance. This probably happened during the late stage of planetary migration when the evolution of the $s_8$ frequency was very slow, and the conditions for capture into the spin-orbit resonance with $s_8$ were satisfied. However, whether or not Saturn is in the spin-orbit resonance with $s_8$ at the present time is not clear, because the existing observations of Saturn's spin precession and internal structure models have significant uncertainties.