The long-term stability of planetary systems

Long-term stability of planetary systems

The problem:
A point mass is surrounded by N > 1 much smaller masses on nearly circular, nearly coplanar orbits. Is the configuration stable over very long times (up to 1010 orbits)?

Why is this interesting?

one of the oldest problems in theoretical physics what is the fate of the Earth? why are there so few planets in the solar system? can we calibrate geological timescale over the last 50 Myr? how do dynamical systems behave over very long times? Historically, the focus was on the solar system but the context has now become more general: can we explain the properties of extrasolar planetary systems?

Stability of the solar system

Newton:
blind fate could never make all the Planets move one and the same way in Orbs concentric, some inconsiderable irregularities excepted, which could have arisen from the mutual Actions of Planets upon one another, and which will be apt to increase, until this System wants a reformation

Laplace:
An intelligence knowing, at a given instant of time, all forces acting in nature, as well as the momentary positions of all things of which the universe consists, would be able to comprehend the motions of the largest bodies of the world and those of the smallest atoms in one single formula, provided it were sufficiently powerful to subject all data to analysis. To it, nothing would be uncertain; both future and past would be present before its eyes.

Stability of the solar system

The problem:

A point mass is surrounded by N much smaller masses on nearly circular, nearly coplanar orbits. Is the configuration stable over very long times (up to 1010 orbits)?

How can we solve this?

many famous mathematicians and physicists have attempted to find analytic solutions or constraints, with limited success (Newton, Laplace, Lagrange, Gauss, Poincar, Kolmogorov, Arnold, Moser, etc.) only feasible approach is numerical solution of equations of motion by computer, but:
needs 1012 timesteps so lots of CPU needs sophisticated algorithms to avoid buildup of truncation error
geometric integration algorithms + mixed-variable integrators

roundoff error difficult to parallelize; but see

Saha, Stadel & Tremaine (1997) parareal algorithms

Stability of the solar system

d2 x i dt 2

= G

Small corrections include:

general relativity (<10-8) satellites (<10-7)

PN

m j (x i x j ) j = 1 jx i x j j3

+ small corrections

Unknowns include:
asteroids and Kuiper belt (fractional effect < 10-7) solar quadrupole moment (fractional effect < 10-10) mass loss from Sun through radiation and solar wind, and drag of solar wind on planetary magnetospheres (<10-14) 1 AU = 1 astronomical unit Galactic tidal forces (fractional effect <10-13) = Earth-Sun distance passing stars (closest passage about 500 AU) Neptune orbits at 30 AU

Masses mj known to better than 10-9M Initial conditions known to fractional accuracy better than 10-7

Stability of the solar system

To a very good approximation, the solar system is an isolated Hamiltonian system described by a known set of equations, with known initial conditions All we have to do is integrate them for ~1010 orbits (4.5109 yr backwards to formation, or 7109 yr forwards to red-giant stage when Mercury and Venus are swallowed up) Goal is quantitative accuracy ( << 1 radian) over 108 yr and qualitative accuracy over 1010 yr

0 - 55 Myr

+4.5 Gyr

-55 0 Myr

-4.5 Gyr

innermost four planets Ito & Tanikawa (2002)

Ito & Tanikawa (2002)

Pluto s peculiar orbit

Pluto has: the highest eccentricity of any planet (e = 0.250 ) the highest inclination of any planet ( i = 17o ) closest approach to Sun is q = a(1 e) = 29.6 AU, which is smaller than Neptune s semimajor axis ( a = 30.1 AU ) How do they avoid colliding?

Pluto s peculiar orbit

Orbital period of Pluto = 247.7 y Orbital period of Neptune = 164.8 y 247.7/164.8 = 1.50 = 3/2 Resonance ensures that when Pluto is at perihelion it is approximately 90o away from Neptune Resonant argument: = 3(longitude of Pluto) 2 (longitude of Neptune) (perihelion of Pluto) librates around with 20,000 year period (Cohen & Hubbard 1965)

Pluto s peculiar orbit

PPluto/PNeptune early in the history of the solar system there was debris left over between the planets ejection of this debris by Neptune caused its orbit to migrate outwards if Pluto were initially in a low-eccentricity, low-inclination orbit outside Neptune it is inevitably captured into 3:2 resonance with Neptune once Pluto is captured its eccentricity and inclination grow as Neptune continues to migrate outwards other objects may be captured in the resonance as well

Pluto s semi-major axis Pluto s eccentricity

Pluto s inclination

resonant argument Malhotra (1993)

Kuiper belt objects Plutinos (3:2) Centaurs comets as of March 8 2006 (Minor Planet Center)

Two kinds of dynamical system

Regular
highly predictable, wellbehaved small differences grow linearly: x, v t e.g. baseball, golf, simple pendulum, all problems in mechanics textbooks, planetary orbits on short timescales

difficult to predict, erratic small differences grow exponentially at large times: x, v exp(t/tL) where tL is Liapunov time appears regular on timescales short compared to Liapunov time linear growth on short times, exponential growth on long times e.g. roulette, dice, pinball, weather, billiards, double pendulum

Chaotic

t , r a e n li

10 Myr

expo nenti al,

exp(t /tL )

Laskar (1989)

separation in phase space

saturated factor of 10,000 factor of 1000

Pluto

Jupiter

400 million years

300 million years

The orbit of every planet in the solar system is chaotic (Sussman & Wisdom 1988, 1992) separation of adjacent orbits grows exp(t / tL) where Liapunov time tL is 5-20 Myr factor of at least 10100 over lifetime of solar system

saturated
Hayes (astro-ph/0702179)

r y M 2 1 = tL
Integrators: 200 Myr

double-precision (p=53 bits) 2nd order mixed-variable symplectic method with h=4 days and h=8 days double-precision (p=53 bits) 14th order multistep method with h=4 days extended-precision (p=80 bits) 27th order Taylor series method with h=220 days

Chaos in the solar system

orbits of inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars) are chaotic with e-folding times for growth of small changes (Liapunov times) of 5-20 Myr (i.e. 200-1000 e-folds in lifetime of solar system chaos in orbits of outer planets depends sensitively on initial conditions but usually are chaotic positions (orbital phases) of planets are not predictable on timescales longer than 100 Myr the solar system is a poor example of a deterministic universe shapes of some orbits execute random walk on timescales of Gyr or longer

Laskar (1994)

start

finish

Consequences of chaos
orbits of inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars) are chaotic with e-folding times for growth of small changes (Liapunov times) of 5-20 Myr (i.e. 200-1000 e-folds in lifetime of solar system chaos in orbits of outer planets depends sensitively on initial conditions but usually are chaotic positions (orbital phases) of planets are not predictable on timescales longer than 100 Myr the solar system is a poor example of a deterministic universe shapes of some orbits execute random walk on timescales of Gyr or longer most chaotic systems with many degrees of freedom are unstable because chaotic regions in phase space are connected so trajectory wanders chaotically through large distances in phase space ( Arnold diffusion ). Thus solar system is unstable, although probably on very long timescales most likely ejection has already happened one or more times

JSUN

age of solar system

Holman (1997)

Causes of chaos
chaos arises from overlap of resonances orbits with 3 degrees of freedom have three fundamental frequencies i. In spherical potentials, 1=0. In Kepler potentials 1=2=0 so resonances are degenerate planetary perturbations lead to fine-structure splitting of resonances by amount O() where mplanet/M*. two-body resonances have strength O() and width O()1/2. three-body resonances have strength O(2) and width O(), which is matched to fine-structure splitting. Murray & Holman (1999) show that chaos in outer solar system arises from a 3-body resonance with critical argument = 3 (longitude of Jupiter) - 5(longitude of Saturn) - 7(longitude of Uranus) small changes in initial conditions can eliminate or enhance chaos cannot predict lifetimes analytically

Murray & Holman (1999)

(198 planets)

HD 82943
planet 1: m sin I = 1.84mJ P = 435 d e = 0.18 0.04 planet 2: m sin I = 1.85mJ P = 219 d e = 0.38 0.01
(Mayor et al. 2003)

(6 planets)

primary (visible)

secondary (infrared)

mass = 0.69 Jupiter masses radius = 1.35 Jupiter radii ( bloated ) orbital period 3.52 days, orbital radius 0.047 AU or 10 stellar radii stellar obliquity < 10o T = 1130 150 K sodium, oxygen, carbon detected from planetary atmosphere

HD 209458 Brown et al. (2001), Deming et al. (2005)

Transit searches

COROT (France)
launched December 27 2006 180,000 stars over 2.5 yr 0.01% precision

Kepler (U.S.)
launch 10/2008 100,000 stars over 4 yr 0.0001% precision

(4 planets)

Gravitational lensing
surface brightness is conserved so distortion of image of source across larger area of sky implies magnification

Einstein rings around distant galaxies

Beaulieu et al. (2006): 5.5 (+5.5/-2.7) MEarth, 2.6(+1.5/-0.6) AU orbit, 0.22(+0.21/-0.11) MSun, DL=6.61.1 kpc

this is one of the first three planets discovered by microlensing, but the detection probability for a lowmass planet of this kind is 50 times lower terrestrial planets are common

What have we learned?

planets are remarkably common, especially around metal-rich stars (20% even with current technology) probability of finding a planet mass in metals in the star

What have we learned?

giant planets like Jupiter and Saturn are found at very small orbital radii if we had expected this, planets could have been found 20-30 years ago OGLE-TR-56b: M = 1.45 MJupiter, P = 1.21 days, a = 0.0225 AU

What have we learned?

wide range of masses up to 15 Jupiter masses down to 0.02 Jupiter masses = 6 Earth masses incomplete

maximum planet mass

What have we learned?

eccentricities are much larger than in the solar system biggest eccentricity e = 0.93

tidal circularization

What have we learned?

current surveys could (almost) have detected Jupiter Jupiter s eccentricity is anomalous therefore the solar system is anomalous

Some of the big questions:

how do giant planets form at semi-major axes 200 times smaller than any solar-system giant? why are the eccentricities far larger than in the solar system? why are there no planets more massive than 15 MJ? why are planets so common? why is the solar system unusual?

Theory of planet formation:

Theory failed to predict: high frequency of planets existence of planets much more massive than Jupiter sharp upper limit of around 15 MJupiter giant planets at very small semi-major axes high eccentricities

Theory of planet formation:

Theory failed to predict: high frequency of planets existence of planets much more massive than Jupiter sharp upper limit of around 15 MJupiter giant planets at very small semi-major axes high eccentricities Theory reliably predicts: planets should not exist

Planet formation can be divided into two phases: Phase 1

protoplanetary gas disk dust disk planetesimals planets solid bodies grow in mass by 45 orders of magnitude through at least 6 different processes lasts 0.01% of lifetime (1 Myr) involves very complicated physics (gas, dust, turbulence, etc.)

Phase 2
subsequent dynamical evolution of planets due to gravity lasts 99.99% of lifetime (10 Gyr) involves very simple physics (only gravity)

Planet formation can be divided into two phases: Creation science

protoplanetary gas disk dust disk planetesimals planets solid bodies grow in mass by 45 orders of magnitude through at least 6 different processes lasts 0.01% of lifetime (1 Myr) involves very complicated physics (gas, dust, turbulence, etc.)

Theory of evolution
subsequent dynamical evolution of planets due to gravity lasts 99.99% of lifetime (10 Gyr) involves very simple physics (only gravity)

Modeling phase 2 (M. Juric, Ph.D. thesis)

distribute N planets randomly between a=0.1 AU and 100 AU, uniform in log(a); N=3-50 choose masses randomly between 0.1 and 10 Jupiter masses, uniform in log(m) choose small eccentricities and inclinations with specified e2, i2 include physical collisions repeat 200-1000 times for each parameter set N, e2, i2 follow for 100 Myr to 1 Gyr K=(number of planets per system) X (number of orbital periods) X (number of systems) here K=51012, factor 50 more than before

Modeling phase 2 - results

Crudely, planetary systems can be divided into two kinds: inactive: large separations or low masses Hill = tidal = Roche radius eccentricities and inclinations remain small preserve state they had at end of phase 1 active: small separations or large masses multiple ejections, collisions, etc. eccentricities and inclinations grow


partially active active

most active systems end up with an average of only 2-3 planets, i.e., 1 planet per decade

inactive

solar system (all)

solar system (giants) inactive extrasolar planets

partially active

active

all active systems converge to a common spacing (median a in units of Hill radii) solar system is not active

inactive

partially active initial eccentricity distributions

a wide variety of active systems converge to a common eccentricity distribution

active

inactive

partially active initial eccentricity distributions

a wide variety of active systems converge to a common eccentricity distribution which agrees with the observations see also Chatterjee, Ford & Rasio (2007)

active

Summary
we can integrate the solar system for its lifetime the solar system is not boring on long timescales planet orbits are probably chaotic with e-folding times of 5-20 Myr the orbital phases of the planets are not predictable over timescales > 100 Myr Is the solar system stable? can only be answered statistically it is unlikely that any planets will be ejected or collide before the Sun dies most of the solar system is full , and it is likely that planets have been lost from the solar system in the past the solar system is anomalous currently, planet-formation theory in Phase 1 (first 1 Myr) has virtually no predictive power relative roles of Phase 1 and Phase 2 (last 10 Gyr) are poorly understood, but Phase 2 may be important a late phase of dynamical evolution lasting 10-100 Myr can explain two observed properties of extrasolar planet systems: eccentricity distribution typical separation in multi-planet systems