Award Date

5-15-2026

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Physics and Astronomy

First Committee Member

Jason Steffen

Second Committee Member

Rebecca Martin

Third Committee Member

Zhaohuan Zhu

Fourth Committee Member

Elisabeth Hausrath

Number of Pages

36

Abstract

The Yarkovsky-O’Keefe-Radzievskii-Paddack (YORP) effect is a radiation-induced torque that can affect the spin and rotational obliquity of small bodies. It has been observed to alter the rotation rate of asteroids in the Solar System (Lowry et al. 2007; Taylor et al. 2007). Under extreme circumstances, YORP can cause a body to fragment, inducing a cascade of fissions. This effect may be important in driving the pollution of white dwarf atmospheres in conjunction with other radiative forces. I developed a YORP calculator for REBOUNDX (Tamayo et al. 2020), an extensional library to the N-body integrator REBOUND (Rein & Liu 2012). I show how this module can be used to simulate the dynamics of small bodies around a red giant. In the case of zero initial obliquity, a cascade of fissions does occur. However, with any initial obliquity, the asteroid evolves through repeated YORP cycles in which fragmentation is no longer guaranteed. Further work is needed to determine whether the YORP effect is a meaningful contributor to white dwarf pollution. Future simulations will incorporate the YORP effect with other radiative and gravitational forces in REBOUNDX to study this question.

Keywords

asteroid dynamics; asteroid rotation; astronomy software; N-body simulations; orbital evolution; radiative processes

Disciplines

Astrophysics and Astronomy | Other Physics | Physics

File Format

PDF

File Size

5500 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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