Configuration of the Martian dust rings: Shapes, densities and size-distributions from direct integrations of particle trajectories

TL;DR

This study uses detailed numerical simulations to analyze the shapes, densities, and size distributions of Martian dust rings formed by ejecta from Phobos and Deimos, providing insights into their structure and observational properties.

Contribution

It presents the first comprehensive numerical integration of dust particle trajectories from Martian moons, including complex forces, to characterize ring configurations and compare with observations.

Findings

Phobos dust ring dominated by grains smaller than 2 microns

Deimos dust ring dominated by grains 5-20 microns

Quantified asymmetries, densities, and optical depths of the rings

Abstract

It is expected since the early 1970s that tenuous dust rings are formed by grains ejected from the Martian moons Phobos and Deimos by impacts of hypervelocity interplanetary projectiles. In this paper, we perform direct numerical integrations of a large number of dust particles originating from Phobos and Deimos. In the numerical simulations, the most relevant forces acting on dust are included: Martian gravity with spherical harmonics up to 5th degree and 5th order, gravitational perturbations from the Sun, Phobos, and Deimos, solar radiation pressure, as well as the Poynting-Robertson drag. In order to obtain the ring configuration, simulation results of various grain sizes ranging from submicron to 100 microns are averaged over a specified initial mass distribution of ejecta. We find that for the Phobos ring grains smaller than about 2 microns are dominant; while the Deimos ring is dominated by dust in the size range of about 5-20 microns. The asymmetries, number densities and geometrical optical depths of the rings are quantified from simulations. The results are compared with the upper limits of the optical depth inferred from Hubble observations. We compare to previous work and discuss the uncertainties of the models.