Detection of the Irregular Shape of the Southern Limb of Menoetius from Observations of the 2017-2018 Patroclus-Menoetius Mutual Events

• Published in: The Planetary Science Journal
• Main Authors: Pinilla-Alonso, Noemi, Popescu, Marcel, Licandro, Javier, Fernandez-Valenzuela, Estela, Grundy, Will M., Duffard, René D., Cabrera-Lavers, Antonio, Hidalgo Soto, Diego, Luis Rizos, Juan, Morate, David
• Other Authors: Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (España)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: IOP Publishing 2022
• Subjects: Observatorio; South Pole; South pole
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10261/309017; https://doi.org/10.3847/PSJ/ac9f11

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. This work presents the analysis of seven mutual events of the Patroclus–Menoetius system (PMS) observed during the last season of mutual events, in 2017–2018. We compare the obtained light curves with those predicted using Grundy et al. and discuss the differences in the timing of the events and the drop of magnitude. Based on models of these observations, we present a collection of orbital parameters that provide the best fit for the observed events and compare the new solutions for the orbit of the system with solutions provided in the literature. Furthermore, we also discuss an interesting finding in the light curve of the only superior event in our collection. This light curve (the one with the best signal-to-noise ratio in our data set) shows the imprint of a possible crater in the south pole of Menoetius as deep as a fourth of its radius. © 2022. The Author(s). Published by the American Astronomical Society. his work is partially based on observations made with the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC), in the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Spain, under Director's Discretionary Time. Partially based on observations obtained with the SARA Observatory 0.9 m telescope at Kitt Peak, which is owned and operated by the Southeastern Association for Research in Astronomy. This research is partially based on observations collected at Sierra Nevada Observatory (OSN) in Granada, Spain, which is operated by Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (CSIC). This article is based on observations made with the Carlos Sánchez Telescope located at the island of Tenerife and operated by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias in the Spanish Observatorio del Teide. N.P.-A. and E.F.-V. acknowledge ...