Prediction of meteoroid stream structure based on meteoroid fragmentation

Abstract

Every day, large number of meteoroids enter the Earth’s atmosphere and deposit their mass either in atomic form or in ionic form depending on whether it has undergone ablation or fragmentation. The heavier meteoroids undergo fragmentation while the lighter ones are more prone to ablate. In this paper, we would like to speculate meteoroid stream structure of Leonid meteor shower based on fragmenting meteoroids. A 23 revolutions old meteoroid trail left behind by the comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle in the year 1213 AD, which instigated Leonid meteor shower in the year 2010 is considered for our study. We have calculated mass of the meteoroids, echo durations and percentage of fragmentation. From the observed echo durations of meteoroids, estimated masses and from the percentage of fragmentation, we visualize the stream structure to be like the lighter particles wrapping up the heavier ones. The results we draw from these three different studies are matching with each other. To our knowledge, we are the first to speculate on the meteor stream structure based on fragmentation and making it a new tool in meteor stream evolution. Based on echo durations, it has been observed that 72% of the activity during the shower is contributed by lighter particles of the stream. It is found that about 20% of the meteoroids have undergone fragmentation indicating the minimal role of heavier particles (>$10^{-6}$ g) during Leonid Meteor Shower (LMS). The masses of the meteors are estimated to be in the range of $10^{-10}$–$10^{-5}$ g.