A minor planet in an outer resonance with Uranus

TL;DR

This study identifies a minor planet in a stable 3:4 mean motion resonance with Uranus, extending its observational data and discovering similar objects, revealing a previously unreported resonance.

Contribution

It reports the first identification of a minor planet in a stable Uranus resonance and extends the data-arc for better orbital understanding.

Findings

2015 OU$_{194}$ is in a stable 3:4 resonance with Uranus.

Additional objects, 2013 RG$_{98}$ and 2014 NX$_{65}$, show similar orbital behaviors.

No prior literature mentions objects in this specific Uranus resonance.

Abstract

We have located archival observations of the centaur 2015 OU$_{194}$ from 2017 and 2018, which extend its data-arc length from 1.0 to 3.5 years. We show that it is in an outer $3:4$ mean motion resonance with Uranus, henceforth referred to as U$_{3/4}$. The resonance is stable from at least 1000 kyrs in the past till 500 kyrs in the future. We find no mention in the literature of known objects in this resonance, or in any other resonance between the orbits of Uranus and Neptune. Looking for additional candidates, we find that 2013 RG$_{98}$ also stays in U$_{3/4}$ for several hundred kyrs around the present epoch. A third candidate, 2014 NX$_{65}$, is strongly influenced by Neptune.