The heliocentric analysis found a momentum-enhancement factor of about two for the Didymos system. That means the impact changed the system's momentum by roughly twice the spacecraft's direct contribution along the measured direction, with escaping ejecta providing additional recoil. The result supports the importance of the target's physical properties when predicting how strongly an impact will deflect an asteroid.
413 words · auto-generated from the episode video
44:28it's like you have li you know what is it a necessity breeds invention and they're like okay we don't got time >> we don't Yeah. >> What are we going to do? It's >> like well what if >> Yeah. And it worked. >> Very good. >> Very good. And and so now from there we can actually calculate the momentum enhancement along the heliocentric path not just the local path but how much boost did both of them get >> yes >> on their way around the earth the the sun given that >> my you know kamicazi drone satellite had a certain momentum how much momentum boost did they get and the beta that we get is about two a little bit more than two so twice as much momentum was transferred to that system >> than what we put in because of all the ejection that came out the back. So
45:09basically the amount of momentum we put in that same amount was ejected out. >> Mhm. >> Yeah. Yeah. I thought it was pretty cool. >> That's very nice. >> It also confirms like the density of this >> moonlet. Yeah. It's about significantly lower than solid silicate rock which means that it's like highly porous. It's actually not like just like normal rock. It's like a very light rock. >> It's like the rock you are supposed to wash your feet with. What do they call it? Pum like pum. >> Yeah. Yeah. Pummus stone. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It's 1630 kg per meter cubed. >> Okay, >> which is so it's still going to um it's still going to sink in water. Water is 1,00 kg per meter cubed. I just want you not that much more dense than water. >> I just want to note we uh just
45:50implemented a latex notation in our script notes. >> Yeah, it's pretty great. >> Uh which sign displays a real formula and I'm looking at this and you just rift that off the cuff so quick. >> Yeah, cuz I can I can actually read it. Also the the beta with the unders like there's a subscript you know beta h along because that's the beta heliospheric along the path. Before I had to like read the latex where it would go slash beta underscore um parenthes squiggly parenthesis h oh my god >> it's now it's in English. >> Yeah now it's in actual English. Very good.
AstrophysicsOrbital MechanicsPlanetary DefensePrecision Measurement