Could the 47 UMa Planetary System be a Second Solar System: predicting the Earth-like planets

Astrophysics, abstract
astro-ph/0506374

From: Jianghui Ji [view email]

Date: Thu, 16 Jun 2005 08:42:39 GMT   (850kb)

(Abridged)We numerically investigated the dynamical architecture of 47 UMa
with the planetary configuration of the best-fit orbital solutions by Fischer
et al. We systematically studied the existence of Earth-like planets in the
region 0.05 AU $\leq a \leq 2.0$ AU for 47 UMa with numerical simulations, and
we also explored the packed planetary geometry and Trojan planets in the
system. In the simulations, we found that "hot Earths" at 0.05 AU $\leq a < $
0.4 AU can dynamically survive at least for 1 Myr. The Earth-like planets can
eventually remain in the system for 10 Myr in areas involved in the mean motion
resonances (MMR) (e.g., 3:2 MMR) with the inner companion. Moreover, we showed
that the 2:1 and 3:1 resonances are on the fringe of stability, while the 5:2
MMR is unstable. Additionally, the 2:1 MMR marks out a remarkable boundary
between chaotic and regular motions, inside, most of the orbits can survive,
outside, they are mostly lost in the orbital evolution. In a dynamical sense,
the most likely candidate for habitable environment is Earth-like planets with
orbits in the ranges 0.8 AU $\leq a < 1.0$ AU and 1.0 AU $ < a < 1.30$ AU
(except several unstable cases) with relatively low eccentricities. The Trojan
planets with low eccentricities and inclinations can secularly last at the
triangular equilibrium points of two massive planets. Hence, the 47 UMa
planetary system may be a close analog to our solar system.

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