Trajectory design strategies applied to temporary comet capture including Poincaré maps and invariant manifolds

Abstract

Temporary satellite capture (TSC) of Jupiter-family comets has been a focus of investigation within the astronomy community for decades. More recently, TSC has been approached from the perspective of dynamical systems theory, within the context of the circular restricted three-body problem (CR3BP). Thus, this problem serves as a testbed for exploring techniques that support trajectory design in similar dynamical regimes. In particular, an association between the invariant manifolds of libration point orbits and the paths of comets that experience TSC has been explored. In this investigation, TSC is further examined from the perspective of transit, that is, transition through the gateways associated with the collinear libration points, in the three-body problem. Periapsis Poincare maps, previously employed for trajectory design in several investigations, are used to deliver insight into the nature of transit trajectories for energy levels near those associated with several Jupiter-family comets. The evolution of transit trajectories with increasing energy is explored, and the existence of solutions with similar characteristics to the paths of comets P/1996 R2, 82P/Gehrels 3, and 147P/Kushida–Muramatsu is demonstrated within the context of the planar CR3BP using planar periapsis maps. During TSC, the path of comet 111P/Helin–Roman–Crockett is highly inclined with respect to Jupiter; the motion of this comet is examined relative to invariant manifolds in the spatial CR3BP. A method to display the information contained in higher-dimensional Poincare maps is also demonstrated, and is employed to locate a trajectory possessing the same qualitative characteristics as the path of 111P/Helin–Roman–Crockett.