Rory Hopkins edited Introduction.tex  over 8 years ago

Commit id: d264d5ceb7210cc8e8fc4e4b4e185f743b3a0f9f

deletions | additions      

       

At a region between roughly 40 AU and 50 AU, the Kuiper Belt contains planetesimals thought to remnants of the protoplanetary disk in the early Solar System. There are 3 types of object which occupy the Kuiper Belt: Scattered Objects, Hot Classicals, and Cold Classicals.  Scattered Objects have highly eccentric and inclined orbits, not constrained to the 40-50 AU region, believed to be due to Neptune's early migration outwards when Jupiter and Saturn entered a 2:1 resonance. This migration scattered the primordial Kuiper Belt which had occupied the region where Neptune orbits today.  Hot Classicals are objects which were believed to have been scattered by Neptune but not to the extent of the Scattered Objects. These objects would've had their eccentricities and inclinations increased, but ultimately would find stable orbits within 2:3 and 1:2 resonances with Neptune, thus being deemed "Classical"  Cold Classicals are objects which are believed to be unaffected by Neptune's early migration, being formed between 40 Au and 50 AU with low eccentricities and inclinations, and remaining stable and unscattered except through self-interactions. Since the Cold Classical Kuiper Belt Objects (CCKBOs) presumably are only affected by self-scattering, by understanding that process it would be possible to simulate these objects over the age of the Solar System to see if that alone can reproduce the observed orbital properties of CCKBOs.