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Authors: Thomas P. C.
Year: 1989
Title: The shapes of small satellites
Journal: Icarus
Volume: 77
Pages: 248-274
Keywords: Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Phobos, Deimos, faint, planetology
Abstract: Limb coordinates from spacecraft images have been used to measure the shapes of the small satellites of Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus, with a view to the quantitative testing of those shapes' physical significance. A comparison of eight small satellites' ellipsoidal models with equilibrium ellipsoids indicates that the shapes of even moderately irregular satellites are poor predictors of mean densities; icy satellites smaller than about 150 km in mean radius are irregularly shaped, and exhibit no trend in roughness. Larger icy satellites are ellipsoidal, and rocky satellites with mean radius in the 6-110 km range are also irregularly shaped.
%F: AA(Cornell University, Ithaca, NY)
Bibliogaphic Code: 1989Icar...77..248T

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