Masses and Densities of Dwarf Planet Satellites Measured with ALMA

Abstract

We have used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array to measure precise absolute astrometric positions and detect the astrometric wobble of dwarf planet Orcus and its satellite Vanth over a complete orbit. We also place upper limits to the astrometric wobble induced by Dysnomia on dwarf planet Eris around its orbit. From the Vanth–Orcus barycentric motion, we find a Vanth–Orcus mass ratio of 0.16 ± 0.02—the highest of any known planet or dwarf planet. This large ratio is consistent with the hypothesis that Vanth is a largely intact impactor from a giant collision in the system and that the system has likely evolved to a double synchronous state. We find only an upper limit of the barycenter motion of Eris, which implies a 1σ upper limit to the Dysnomia–Eris mass ratio of 0.0085, close to the modeled transition region between giant impact generated satellites, which are largely intact remnants of the original impactor and those which form out of reaccreted disk material left over postimpact. The low albedo of Dysnomia leads us to marginally favor the intact impactor scenario. We find that Dysnomia has a density of <1.2 g cm−3, significantly lower than the 2.4 g cm−3 of Eris.