INTERIOR MODELS OF URANUS AND NEPTUNE
By R. Helled, J. Anderson, M. Podolak, Gerald Schubert. 2010
172 citations recorded by the source corpus.
“Empirical” models (pressure versus density) of Uranus and Neptune interiors constrained by the gravitational coefficients J2, J4, the planetary radii and masses, and Voyager solid-body rotation periods are presented. The empirical pressure–density profiles are then interpreted in terms of physical equations of state of hydrogen, helium, ice (H2O), and rock (SiO2) to test the physical plausibility of the models. The compositions of Uranus and Neptune are found to be similar with somewhat different distributions of the high-Z material. The big difference between the two planets is that Neptune requires a non-solar envelope, while Uranus is best matched with a solar composition envelope. Our analysis suggests that the heavier elements in both Uranus' and Neptune's interior might increase gradually toward the planetary centers. Indeed it is possible to fit the gravitational moments without sharp compositional transitions.
Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Molecular Biology
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/0f215b1f7b15ca9577f70a4104df8bbf516881b5
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In Astronomy and Astrophysics
- C. Mordasini
- Th. Henning
- Jon Fortney
- Y. Alibert
- Anders Johansen
- N. Madhusudhan
- Michiel Lambrechts
- H. Klahr
In Molecular Biology
Citations in the corpus
- New indication for a dichotomy in the interior structure of Uranus and Neptune from the application of modified shape and rotation data (2012, methodology): “We find that the resulting bulk composition is insensitive to the current level of uncertainty in the input data (observational constraints and equations of state) as our results are in good agreement with previous calculations (e.g. Podolak et al. 1995; Marley et al. 1995; Helled et al. 2011).”
- Characterization of exoplanets from their formation - II. The planetary mass-radius relationship (2012, background): “The gravitational moments can instead be reproduced with models without hard density jumps (Helled et al. 2011).”
- THE IMPRINT OF EXOPLANET FORMATION HISTORY ON OBSERVABLE PRESENT-DAY SPECTRA OF HOT JUPITERS (2016, methodology): “For very massive giant planets, the composition of the gas becomes important, too (Helled et al. 2011; Mordasini et al. 2014).”
- Forming the cores of giant planets from the radial pebble flux in protoplanetary discs (2014, background): “This is encouraging because Uranus and Neptune have very similar core masses, respectively Mc,U ≈ 13 ME and Mc,N ≈ 15 ME (Helled et al. 2011).”