Disassociation energies for the finite density N-body problem

Abstract

This paper considers the energy required for collections of finite density bodies to undergo escape under internal gravitational interactions alone. As the level of the system energy is increased there are different combinations of components that can escape, until the total energy becomes positive, when the entire system can undergo mutual disruption. The results are also defined for bodies modeled as a continuum. These results provide rigorous constraints for the disruption of rubble pile asteroids when only considering gravitational interaction effects, with the energy provided by rotation of an initial collection of the system. These issues are considered for discrete particles in the N body problem and for size distributions of discrete particles in the continuum limit.