kinetic impact and gravitational perturbations for asteroid deflection

Abstract

Asteroids have called the attention of researchers around the world. Its chemical and physical composition can give us important information about the formation of our Solar System. In addition, the hypothesis of mining some of these objects is considered, since they contain precious metals. However, some asteroids have their orbits close to the orbit of the Earth. These nearby objects can pose a danger to our life in the planet, since some of them are large enough to cause catastrophic damage to the Earth. We will pay attention to the theme of deflecting a potentially dangerous asteroid. There are currently two main forms of this deviation: i) the impact of an object at high velocity with the asteroid, which can be a space vehicle or a smaller asteroid; ii) the use of a gravitational "tractor", which consist in placing an object (another asteroid or part of an asteroid), close to the body that is approaching the Earth, such that this gravitational interference can deflect its trajectory. In this work, we will evaluate the influence of gravitational perturbations in the most commonly mentioned asteroid deflection model in the literature, the kinetic impact deflection technique. With the impact, it is intended to change the kinetic energy of the asteroid, changing its orbit enough so that it does not present risks of impacts with the Earth.