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Some active asteroids have been proposed to be the result of impact events. Because active asteroids are generally discovered serendipitously only after their tail formation, the process of the impact ejecta evolving into a tail has never been directly observed. NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, apart from having successfully changed the orbital period of Dimorphos, demonstrated the activation process of an asteroid from an impact under precisely known impact conditions. Here we report the observations of the DART impact ejecta with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) from impact time T+15 minutes to T+18.5 days at spatial resolutions of ~2.1 km per pixel. Our observations reveal a complex evolution of ejecta, which is first dominated by the gravitational interaction between the Didymos binary system and the ejected dust and later by solar radiation pressure. The lowest-speed ejecta dispersed via a sustained tail that displayed a consistent morphology with previously observed asteroid tails thought to be produced by impact. The ejecta evolution following DART's controlled impact experiment thus provides a framework for understanding the fundamental mechanisms acting on asteroids disrupted by natural impact., accepted by Nature

The various dynamical classes in the trans-Neptunian region record the history of Neptune’s migration early in solar system history. The low-inclination, low-eccentricity cold classical objects are thought to be the remnants of the outer primordial disk of minor bodies, left undisturbed by the migration of Neptune, while all other classes were implanted on their current orbits from smaller heliocentric distances through interaction with Neptune. Many other trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) were lost from the solar system entirely or transferred onto crossing orbits that resulted in collisions. Not unexpectedly, two very different populations of TNO binary systems are observed: (1) large TNOs with small satellites on relatively tight orbits and (2) small TNOs, mostly cold classicals, with roughly equal-sized components and relatively large separations. This stark contrast points to two very different formation mechanisms—giant impacts and co-formation—and corresponding expectations for the compositions of the components. Giant impacts are more likely to result in different compositions for the primary and secondary, while co-formation implies similar compositions. Observations with the JWST NIRSpec IFU provide sufficient spatial resolution to resolve TNO binaries and sufficient sensitivity to obtain spectra of both components. We have examined data for both large and small TNO binaries from GTO and GO programs and present spectral comparisons of the primaries and secondaries. The results of this work have implications for the early dynamical history and collisional environment in our own outer solar system, with links to other planetary systems with observed debris disks.

Of all the myriad environments in our Solar System, the least explored are the distant Ice Giants Uranus and Neptune, and their diverse satellite and ring systems. These ‘intermediate-sized’ worlds are the last remaining class of Solar System planet to be characterised by a dedicated robotic mission, and may shape the paradigm for the most common outcome of planetary formation throughout our galaxy. In response to the 2019 European Space Agency call for scientific themes in the 2030s and 2040s (known as Voyage 2050), we advocated that an international partnership mission to explore an Ice Giant should be a cornerstone of ESA’s science planning in the coming decade, targeting launch opportunities in the early 2030s. This article summarises the inter-disciplinary science opportunities presented in that White Paper [1], and briefly describes developments since 2019.

The discovery of long period comet C/2014 UN271 (Bernardinelli-Bernstein) announced in June 2021 quickly suggested an inactive nucleus with an absolute magnitude of HV = 7.8 mag [1], which implied a diameter between 130 and 260 km assuming geometric albedos between 2% and 8%. Immediate follow-up observations with our Las Cumbres Observatory (LCO) Outbursting Objects Key project (LOOK) [2] as well as with SkyGems Namibia [3] revealed that the comet was active at 20.18 au. Evidence was quickly found that C/2014 UN271 had been active since 2018 and possibly even active at the time it was first observed in 2014 (at 29 au) [4,5]. After the discovery announcement, follow-up observations with ALMA and HST determined that Bernardinelli-Bernstein has a cometary albedo (0.033 ± 0.009) and an effective diameter of 137 ± 17 km, distinguishing it as the largest observed Oort-cloud comet [6,7]. Prior to the observations of C/2014 UN271, the most distant comet discoveries were C/2010 U3 and C/2017 K2, which were made between 15 and 20 au, but for which pre-discovery images indicate activity beyond 20 au [8,9]. C/2014 UN271 was significantly brighter than those comets at the same distance, which provided an exceptional opportunity to characterize its very distant comet activity close to 20 au. In this presentation we will report the results of our observing program with FORS2 on ESO’s 8-meter VLT in July and August 2021. The VLT/FORS data are interpreted in combination with targeted observations with the 4.1-m SOAR and the long-term monitoring campaign with 1-m facilities within the LOOK Project [10,11]. The multi-facility long-term photometric monitoring of C/2014 UN271 enabled our team to identify three outbursts between June and September 2021, indicating that the comet's optical brightness was dominated by cometary outbursts during the VLT observing run. Our VLT/FORS2 multi-band imaging and spectroscopic observations allowed us therefore to characterize the comet’s outburst in terms of spectral slope and coma morphology, including arc-like features. We will also present our efforts to characterize the comet’s short-term variability and rotation period. References: [1] https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K21/K21M53.html [2] Kokotanekova, R., et al. (2021), ATel, 14733 [3] https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K21/K21M83.html [4] https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K21/K21M83.html [5] Farnham, T. (2021), ATel, 14759 [6] Lellouch, E. et al. (2022) A&,659, L1, 8 [7] Hui, M.-T., et al. (2022) ApJL, 929, 1, L12, 7 [8] Hui, M.-T., et al. (2019) AJ 157 [9] Jewitt, D. et al. (2021) AJ 161, 188 [10] Lister et al., submitted [11] Kelley et al., submitted.

Planetesimals inevitably bear the signatures of their natal environment, preserving in their composition a record of the metallicity of their system's original gas and dust, albeit one altered by the formation process. When planetesimals are dispersed from their system of origin, this record is carried with them. As each star is likely to contribute at least $10^{12}$ interstellar objects, the Galaxy's drifting population of interstellar objects (ISOs) provides an overview of the properties of its stellar population through time. Using the EAGLE cosmological simulation and models of protoplanetary formation, our modelling predicts an ISO population with a bimodal distribution in their water mass fraction. Objects formed in low-metallicity, typically older, systems have a higher water fraction than their counterparts formed in high-metallicity protoplanetary disks, and these water-rich objects comprise the majority of the population. Both detected ISOs seem to belong to the lower water fraction population; these results suggest they come from recently formed systems. We show that the population of ISOs in galaxies with different star formation histories will have different proportions of objects with high and low water fractions. This work suggests that it is possible that the upcoming Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time will detect a large enough population of ISOs to place useful constraints on models of protoplanetary disks, as well as galactic structure and evolution., Accepted by ApJ Letters, 9 pages

Interstellar comets offer direct samples of volatiles from distant protoplanetary disks. 2I/Borisov is the first notably active interstellar comet discovered in our solar system[1]. Comets are condensed samples of the gas, ice, and dust that were in a star's protoplanetary disk during the formation of its planets and inform our understanding on how chemical compositions and abundances vary with distance from the central star. Their orbital migration moves volatiles[2], organic material, and prebiotic chemicals in their host system[3]. In our solar system, hundreds of comets have been observed remotely, and a few have been studied up close by space missions[4]. However, knowledge of extrasolar comets has been limited to what could be gleaned from distant, unresolved observations of cometary regions around other stars, with only one detection of carbon monoxide[5]. Here we report that the coma of 2I/Borisov contains significantly more CO than H2O gas, with abundances of at least 173%, more than three times higher than previously measured for any comet in the inner (

The cold main classical Kuiper Belt consists of those non-resonant small solar system bodies with low orbital inclinations and orbital semi-major axes between 42.4 and 47.7 au. These objects likely formed \textit{in situ} and the population has experienced minimal collisional modification since formation. Using the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS) ensemble sample and characterization, combined with constraints from deeper surveys and supported by evidence from the Minor Planet Center catalog and the Deep Ecliptic Survey, we determine the absolute magnitude $H_r$ distribution of the cold classical belt from $H_r\simeq5$ to 12 (roughly diameters of 400 km to 20 km). We conclude that the cold population's $H_r$ distribution exhibits an exponential cutoff at large sizes. Exponential cutoffs at large sizes are not a natural outcome of pair-wise particle accretion but exponentially tapered power-law size distributions are a feature of numerical simulations of planetesimal formation via a streaming instability. Our observation of an exponential cutoff agrees with previous observational inferences that no large objects ($D \gtrsim 400$ km) exist in the cold population. We note that the asymptotic slope of the $H_r$ distribution is consistent with $\alpha \sim 0.4$ and this asymptotic slope is also found in streaming instability modelling of planetesimal formation and is thus not necessarily associated with achieving collisional equilibrium. Studies of the transneptunian region are providing the parameters that will enable future streaming-instability studies to determine the initial conditions of planetesimal formation in the $\approx$45 au region of the Sun's protoplanetary disk., Comment: 20 pages, 2 figures, accepted in AAS Journals

The cold classical Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) possess a high, ≳30% binary fraction. Widely separated and dynamically fragile, these binary systems have been useful in tracing the origins of KBOs. A new class of binaries was recently identified by their colors. The so-called blue binaries are unanimously members of the less red compositional class, and exhibit a 100% binary fraction. They appear to be push-out survivors, emplaced in the classical region during Neptune’s phases of outward migration. The presence of these binary systems implies that the majority of objects that formed near the cold classical region formed as binaries. Here we present new optical color measurements of cold classical KBOs from the Colors of the Outer Solar System Origins Survey, including colors of a blue binary discovered by the Solar System Origins Legacy Survey—2015 RJ277. The increased size of the colors sample has resulted in order-of-magnitude decrease in the probability that the binaries and singles sample share the same color distribution. From the Anderson–Darling statistic, this probability is only a 0.3%, while it is only 0.002% when utilizing the difference of means statistic. We find a hint that the blue binaries have inflated free inclinations compared to their red counterparts, consistent with the push-out origin for these bodies.

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While collisional families are common in the asteroid belt, only one is known in the Kuiper belt, linked to the dwarf planet Haumea. The characterization of Haumea's family helps to constrain its origin and, more generally, the collisional history of the Kuiper belt. However, the size distribution of the Haumea family is difficult to constrain from the known sample, which is affected by discovery biases. Here, we use the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS) Ensemble to look for Haumea family members. In this OSSOS XVI study we report the detection of three candidates with small ejection velocities relative to the family formation centre. The largest discovery, 2013 UQ15, is conclusively a Haumea family member, with a low ejection velocity and neutral surface colours. Although the OSSOS Ensemble is sensitive to Haumea family members to a limiting absolute magnitude (Hr) of 9.5 (inferred diameter of ~90 km), the smallest candidate is significantly larger, Hr = 7.9. The Haumea family members larger than approximately 20 km in diameter must be characterized by a shallow H-distribution slope in order to produce only these three large detections. This shallow size distribution suggests that the family formed in a graze-and-merge scenario, not a catastrophic collision.

The minor planets on orbits that are dynamically stable in Neptune's 1:1 resonance on Gyr timescales were likely emplaced by Neptune's outward migration. We explore the intrinsic libration amplitude, eccentricity, and inclination distribution of Neptune's stable Trojans, using the detections and survey efficiency of the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS) and Pan-STARRS1. We find that the libration amplitude of the stable Neptunian Trojan population can be well modeled as a Rayleigh distribution with a libration amplitude width $\sigma_{A_phi}$ of 15$^\circ$. When taken as a whole, the Neptune Trojan population can be acceptably modeled with a Rayleigh eccentricity distribution of width $\sigma_e$ of 0.045 and a typical sin(i) x Gaussian inclination distribution with a width $\sigma_i$ of 14 +/- 2 degrees. However, these distributions are only marginally acceptable. This is likely because, even after accounting for survey detection biases, the known large Hr < 8 and small Hr >= 8 Neptune Trojans appear to have markedly different eccentricities and inclinations. We propose that like the classical Kuiper belt, the stable intrinsic Neptunian Trojan population have dynamically `hot' and dynamically `cold' components to its eccentricity/inclination distribution, with $\sigma_{e-cold}$ ~ 0.02 / $\sigma_{i-cold}$ ~ 6$^\circ$ and $\sigma_{e-hot}$~ 0.05 / $\sigma_{i-hot}$ ~ 18$^\circ$. In this scenario, the `cold' L4 Neptunian Trojan population lacks the Hr >= 8 members and has 13 +11/-6 `cold' Trojans with Hr < 8. On the other hand, the `hot' L4 Neptunian Trojan population has 136 +57/-48 Trojans with Hr < 10 -- a population 2.4 times greater than that of the L4 Jovian Trojans in the same luminosity range., Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures, v3, accepted for publication in Icarus

Interstellar objects (ISOs), the parent population of 1I/Oumuamua and 2I/Borisov, are abundant in the interstellar medium of the Milky Way. This means that the interstellar medium, including molecular cloud regions, has three components: gas, dust, and ISOs. From the observational constraints for the field density of ISOs drifting in the solar neighbourhood, we infer a typical molecular cloud of 10 pc diameter contains some 10$^{18}$ ISOs. At typical sizes ranging from hundreds of metres to tens of km, ISOs are entirely decoupled from the gas dynamics in these molecular clouds. Here we address the question of whether ISOs can follow the collapse of molecular clouds. We perform low-resolution simulations of the collapse of molecular clouds containing initially static ISO populations toward the point where stars form. In this proof-of-principle study, we find that the interstellar objects definitely follow the collapse of the gas -- and many become bound to the new-forming numerical approximations to future stars (sinks). At minimum, 40\% of all sinks have one or more ISO test particles gravitationally bound to them for the initial ISO distributions tested here. This value corresponds to at least $10^{10}$ actual interstellar objects being bound after three initial free-fall times. Thus, ISOs are a relevant component of star formation. We find that more massive sinks bind disproportionately large fractions of the initial ISO population, implying competitive capture of ISOs. Sinks can also be solitary, as their ISOs can become unbound again -- particularly if sinks are ejected from the system. Emerging planetary systems will thus develop in remarkably varied environments, ranging from solitary to richly populated with bound ISOs., 15 pages, 7 figures, accepted for ApJ

We will present the results of coordinated observations of 2I/Borisov with the Neil Gehrels-Swift observatory (Swift) and Hubble Space Telescope (HST), which allowed us to provide the first glimpse into the ice content and chemical composition of the protoplanetary disk of another star. Comets are condensed samples of the gas, ice and dust that were in a star’s protoplanetary disk during the formation of its planets, and inform our understanding on how chemical compositions and abundances vary with distance from the central star. Their orbital migration distributes volatiles [1], organic material and prebiotic chemicals around their host system [2]. In our Solar System, hundreds of comets have been observed remotely, and a few have been studied up close by space missions [3]. Similarly, interstellar comets offer a glimpse into the building blocks, formation, and evolution of other planetary systems. However, knowledge of extrasolar comets has been limited to what could be gleaned from distant, unresolved observations of cometary regions around other stars. 2I/Borisov, discovered in Aug. 2019, is the first notably active interstellar comet discovered in our Solar System [4]. We used the UltraViolet Optical Telescope (UVOT) of Swift to determine 2I/Borisov’s water production rates and dust content surrounding the nucleus at six epochs spaced before and after perihelion on Dec. 8.55, 2019 UTC (-2.56AU to 2.54AU) [5]. Water production rates increased steadily before perihelion at a rate of increase quicker than that of most dynamically new comets but slower than most Jupiter-family comets. After perihelion, the water production rate decreased much more rapidly than that of all previously observed comets. We used a sublimation model to constrain the active area and minimum radius of the nucleus, and found that a significant fraction of the surface of Borisov is active. We also used Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) on the HST during four epochs around the perihelion and clearly detected the emissions of several bands of the CO Fourth Positive system, which we used to derive CO production rates [6]. Comparing these with the water production rates determined by Swift, we found that after perihelion, the coma of 2I/Borisov contains substantially more CO than H2O gas. Our abundances were more than three times higher than previously measured for any comet in the inner ( Fig. 1 Volatile production rates as a function of time relative to perihelion [6]. The production rates of CO measured with HST/COS (this work) and the water production rate measured by Swift (based on OH, open circles; 5) and the Very Large Telescope/UVES (based on OH, 8), and at the Apache Point Observatory (based on [OI], 9). Arrows indicate 3-σ upper limits, and error bars indicate 1-σ stochastic uncertainties. The grey line indicates the temporal trend of water production rates used to derive the elemental composition. References: [1] Cleeves, L. I. et al. The ancient heritage of water ice in the solar system. Science 345, 1590–1593 (2014). [2] Rubin, M., Bekaert, D. V., Broadley, M. W., Drozdovskaya, M. N., and Wampfler, S. F. Volatile Species in Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko: Investigating the Link from the ISM to the Terrestrial Planets. ACS Publ. 3, 1792–1811 (2019). [3] Bockelée-Morvan, D. & Biver, N. The composition of cometary ices. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 375, 20160252–11 (2017). [4] Guzik, P. et al. Initial characterization of interstellar comet 2I/Borisov. Nature Astron. 4, 53 - 57 (2019). [5] Xing, Z., Bodewits, D., Noonan, J., and Bannister, M. T. Water Production Rates and Activity of Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov. Astrophys. J. 893, L48 (2020). [6] Bodewits, D., Noonan, J. et al. The carbon monoxide-rich interstellar comet 2I/Borisov. Nature Astron. doi:10.1038/s41550-020-1095-2 (2020). [7] Cordiner, M.A., Milam, S.N., Biver, N. et al. Unusually high CO abundance of the first active interstellar comet. Nature doi:Astron.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-020-1087-2 (2020). [8] Lupu, R. E., Feldman, P. D., Weaver, H. A. & Tozzi, G.-P. The Fourth Positive System of Carbon Monoxide in the Hubble Space Telescope Spectra of Comets. Astrophys. J. 670, 1473-1484 (2007). [9] McKay, A. J., Cochran, A. L., Dello Russo, N. & DiSanti, M. A. Detection of a Water Tracer in Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov. Astrophys. J. 889, L10 (2020)

Introduction. Interstellar Probe is a NASA Heliophysics Division mission concept that would leave the solar system on a 50-year prime mission with a primary objective to study the heliosphere and the local interstellar medium (>200 au; Brandt et al., 2020). In order to reach interstellar space, the spacecraft must pass through the trans-Neptunian region, presenting the opportunity to study planets and minor bodies (Brandt et al., 2020). We focus here on the opportunities for exploring trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) with Interstellar Probe. TNO Geoscience Investigation. The primary science instrument for TNO flyby geoscience would be a visible/infrared imaging spectrometer to enable studying a wide range of physical, chemical, and geological processes at temperatures 2, CH4, CO) and non-volatile (H2O, CO2, NH3) ices and refractory organics (e.g., C2H6, tholins). A visible imager would reveal geological, albedo, and color information to investigate surface characteristics and evolution. Opportunities for dwarf planet exploration. The heliophysics science goals will dictate Interstellar Probe’s trajectory, with a consensus coalescing around leaving through the “waist” of the heliosphere between ecliptic longitudes of 300-330° (Brandt et al., 2020; Runyon et al., 2020). There are an estimated 130 dwarf planets—objects >400 km in diameter—beyond Neptune. In or near this region, between -20° and 20° in heliocentric ecliptic latitude, there are five potential dwarf planets that Interstellar Probe could fly by: 2002 MS4, Quaoar, Gonggong, Pluto, and Ixion (Figure 1). Potential dwarf planet targets represent a wide range of colors, compositions, and geological processes. Quaoar is dense (~2 g cm-3; Braga-Ribas et al., 2013) and may therefore have retained enough internal heat to remain geologically active and/or support a subsurface ocean (e.g., Shchuko et al., 2014). Gonggong and its satellite Xiangliu show one of the largest color dichotomies among a primary and satellite (Kiss et al., 2019), and Gonggong may be a contact binary (Pál et al., 2016). Little is known about 2002 MS4 due to its current position in a crowded star field, frustrating ground-based observations, but it is large enough for possible differentiation and a surface dominated by H2O ice and the resultant geological features. Ixion has a flat near-IR spectrum (Barkume et al., 2008; Guilbert et al., 2009), meaning it could provide clues to the substrate present beneath the ice on all TNOs. Pluto would benefit from a follow-up 20+ years after New Horizons to reveal surficial and atmospheric changes. Figure 1. Positions of dwarf planets (black), CCKBOs (red), and extreme TNOs (purple) with respect to the ecliptic on January 1, 2040. Longitudinal regions for the heliospheric nose (pink), tail (yellow), and waist (blue), as well as the heliospheric nose (filled red star) and tail (open red star), are marked. We assumed the trajectory of Interstellar Probe will take it somewhere between ~300-340˚ longitude and -20˚ to 20˚ latitude, opening up the possibility for a flyby of 2002 MS4, Quaoar, Pluto, Ixion, or Gonggong. Prospects for a secondary target flyby. New Horizons’ flyby of Arrokoth (2014 MU69) in 2019 provided a valuable glimpse into the formation history of planetesimals and the pristine surfaces present beyond Neptune (Stern et al., 2019). The flyby of this small TNO (~35 km) revealed the building blocks of the largest TNO, Pluto, New Horizons’ other target. Interstellar Probe could complement the Arrokoth and Pluto flybys via a serendipitous encounter with a TNO We consider the possibility of serendipitous flybys of TNOs An estimated 40,000-60,000 new TNOs to absolute magnitudes >8 will be discovered with the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST; Schwamb et al., 2018). Assuming 45,000, some 16,000 CCKBOs will be known by the early 2030s. Assuming uniform distribution along the ecliptic between 42-47 au, each CCKBO would “occupy” a volume of 0.0875 au2 with a circular radius of ~0.17 au. Defining a reasonable flyby distance of 10-4 au (~15,000 km, comparable to New Horizons’ flyby distance of Pluto), the probability of serendipitously flying-by a particular CCKBO is 3

The interstellar comet 2I/Borisov was discovered on August 20, 2019. It is only the second interstellar object to be observed crossing our Solar System, and the first one for which outgassing was detected directly [1]. Early observations indicated that 2I/Borisov is depleted in C2, similarly to about 30% of Solar System comets [2,3]. Preliminary observations with the MUSE IFU performed in November 2019 confirmed that 2I is depleted in C2 but also showed it is rich in NH2 [4]. We present here results from the full observing campaign performed with the MUSE instrument. MUSE is a multi-unit integral field spectrograph mounted on the UT4 telescope of the VLT [5]. The instrument covers the wavelength range from 480 to 930 nm with a resolving power of about 3000. It has a large field of view of 1’x1’ and a spatial resolution of 0.2”, which makes it an ideal instrument to study extended sources. We observed 2I with MUSE on 16 different dates between November 14, 2019 and March 19, 2020. The observations started about one month before the perihelion passage and continued until the comet reached 3 au post-perihelion. This data sets constitutes a great opportunity to study the activity and coma composition of 2I over several months. Our observations allow us to detect emission bands from C2, NH2, and CN. Using a Haser model [6] we derive production rates for those 3 species and follow their evolution. We also study the evolution of the ratio between those production rates, to monitor how the composition of 2I coma changes as a function of time and distance from the Sun. References: [1] Fitzsimmons et al., 2019, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Volume 885, Issue 1, article id. L9, 6 pp.[2] Opitom et al., 2019, Astronomy & Astrophysics, Volume 631, id.L8, 5 pp.; [3] Lin et al., 2019, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Volume 889, Issue 2, id.L30;[4] Bannister et al, 2020, submitted to ApJ Letters; [5] Bacon et al, 2010, Proceedings of the SPIE, Volume 7735, id. 773508; [6] Haser, 1957,Bulletin de la Classe des Sciences de l'Académie Royale de Belgique, vol. 43, p. 740-750

The low-inclination component of the classical Kuiper Belt is thought to be the only population of trans-Neptunian bodies that formed in-situ (Parker et al., 2010). This population, often referred to as the cold classical objects, exhibits a ~30% observed binary fraction, much higher than for other trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs; Noll et al., 2008). The majority of cold classicals belong to the Very Red (VR) class of the bimodal TNO compositional taxonomy (Fraser and Brown, 2012). Though recently, a population of Less Red (LR) members has been identified, exhibiting a 100% binary fraction (Fraser et al., 2017). These so-called blue binaries are thought to be survivors of a push-out process that occurred during a smooth phase of Neptune’s outward migration. Here we report 20 new (g-r) and (r-J) colours of cold classical objects gathered as part of the Colours of the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (Col-OSSOS; Schwamb et al., 2019), bringing the total sample of cold classicals with measured colours to 21 with simultaneous optical and NIR colours, and 103 cold classical TNOs with optical colours alone. In this sample, 29 objects have been identified as binary (Parker, A., personal communication).Cold classical colours span the full range of optical-NIR colours exhibited by the dynamically excited TNO populations, though they strongly favour red objects; the VR:LR ratio is ~12 compared to ~3 for the excited TNOs. Moreover, the VR cold classicals have a redder colour distribution than the VR excited TNOs, with the former exhibiting a mean (g-r)~0.95 and the latter, a mean (g-r)~0.8.The optical colour distribution of binary cold classicals is significantly different than that of the single (or unresolved) cold classical systems (see Figure 1), with the binary sample exhibiting a tail of lower spectral slopes than is found in the sample of singles. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test comparing the optical colour distributions of the single and binary samples says that there is a only a 0.3% chance the two samples share the same colour distribution. The Col-OSSOS sample on its own shows a similar result, with a 2% probability of the null hypothesis. This argues for a different origin of some or all of the binary cold classicals over the unresolved or single objects population, and is compatible with the hypothesis that the blue binaries are contaminants having been pushed out from regions closer to the Sun. Figure 1: cumulative optical colour distributions of the single (or unresolved; solid) and binary (dashed) cold classical TNOs. The vertical line demarks the division between less red and very red compositional classes. Spectral slope is reported in percent reddening per 100 nm normalized in the V-band.

In August 2019, 2I/Borisov, the second interstellar object and first visibly active interstellar comet, was discovered on a trajectory nearly perpendicular to the ecliptic. Observations of planet forming disks and debris disks serve as probes of the ensemble properties of extrasolar planetesimals, but the passage of an active interstellar comet through our Solar System provides a rare opportunity to individually study these small bodies up close in the same ways in which we investigate objects originating from our own Outer Solar System. Ground-based observations of short period comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko revealed a coma dust composition indistinguishable from what was measured on its nucleus by the orbiting Rosetta spacecraft. Therefore when 2/I Borisov had a dust dominated tail, we attempted to study its composition with near-simultaneous griJ photometry with the Gemini North Telescope. We obtained two epochs of GMOS-N and NIRI observations in November 2019, separated by two weeks. We will report on the inferred optical-near-IR colors of 2I/I Borisov’s dust coma/tail and nucleus. We will compare our measurements to other observations of 2I/Borisov and place the interstellar comet in context with the Col-OSSOS (Colours of the Outer Solar System Survey) sample of small KBOs and interstellar object ʻOumuamua observed in grJ with Gemini North, using the same setup.

Uranus and Neptune, and their diverse satellite and ring systems, represent the least explored environments of our Solar System, and yet may provide the archetype for the most common outcome of planetary formation throughout our galaxy. Ice Giants will be the last remaining class of Solar System planet to have a dedicated orbital explorer, and international efforts are under way to realise such an ambitious mission in the coming decades. In 2019, the European Space Agency released a call for scientific themes for its strategic science planning process for the 2030s and 2040s, known as Voyage 2050. We used this opportunity to review our present-day knowledge of the Uranus and Neptune systems, producing a revised and updated set of scientific questions and motivations for their exploration. This review article describes how such a mission could explore their origins, ice-rich interiors, dynamic atmospheres, unique magnetospheres, and myriad icy satellites, to address questions at the heart of modern planetary science. These two worlds are superb examples of how planets with shared origins can exhibit remarkably different evolutionary paths: Neptune as the archetype for Ice Giants, whereas Uranus may be atypical. Exploring Uranus' natural satellites and Neptune's captured moon Triton could reveal how Ocean Worlds form and remain active, redefining the extent of the habitable zone in our Solar System. For these reasons and more, we advocate that an Ice Giant System explorer should become a strategic cornerstone mission within ESA's Voyage 2050 programme, in partnership with international collaborators, and targeting launch opportunities in the early 2030s., Comment: 34 pages, 9 figures, accepted to Planetary and Space Science

The Colours of the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (Col-OSSOS, Schwamb et al., 2019) has examined the surface compositions of Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) by way of broadband g-, r- and J-band photometry, using the Gemini North Hawaii Telescope. This survey showed a bimodal distribution in the colours of the objects surveyed, consistent with previous colour surveys (Tegler et al., 2016). These broadband surface colours can be considered a proxy for surface composition of these KBOs, so this survey allows the frequency of different surface compositions within the outer Solar System to be explored. The bimodality of the observed colours suggests the presence of some sort of surface transition within the Kuiper belt, perhaps due to a volatile ice-line transition in the pristine planetesimal disk that existed before Neptune’s migration. The Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS, Bannister et al., 2018), from which Col-OSSOS selected objects brighter than 23.6 r-band magnitude, has well characterised and quantified biases, so allowing for comparisons between the observations and numerical models of the Kuiper belt.By applying different colour transitions to the primordial planetesimal disk, in this work we explore the possible positions for ice line/colour transitions within the planetesimal disk that existed before Neptune’s migration. Within Schwamb et al. (2019), a simplified toy model was used to investigate the possible position of this transition. Nesvorny et al. (2020) has investigated the primordial colour fraction, in particular how it can create the inclination distribution that we see in the colours of KBOs today. In this work we use a full dynamical model of the Kuiper belt to more precisely pinpoint the possible location of this transition. We make use of the model by Nesvorny & Vokrouhlicky (2016) of Neptune’s migration from 23 au to 30 au, and the consequent perturbation of the Kuiper belt into its current form. This model allows precise tracking of the objects from their pre-Neptune migration to post-Neptune migration positions, allowing various colour transition positions in the initial disk, an example of which is shown in Figure 1, to be compared with the Col-OSSOS observations of the modern day disk.Figure 1: An example red/neutral transition at 27 au. The left plots show the objects in the primordial disk, while the right plots show the objects post-Neptune migration from the model of Nesvorny & Vokrouhlicky (2016).The OSSOS survey simulator (Lawler et al., 2018) can then be used to calculate which of the simulated objects could have been observed by OSSOS, and so selected by Col-OSSOS for surface colour observations. The colour transition within the initial disk, shown in Figure 1, is moved radially outwards through the disk and the corresponding outputs are compared with the Col-OSSOS colour observations to see which initial disk colour transition positions are consistent with the modern day Kuiper belt. We will present results combing an accurate dynamical model of the Kuiper Belt’s evolution by Nesvorny & Vokrouhlicky (2016) with Col-OSSOS photometry. We will explore multiple radial colour distributions in the primordial planetesimal disk and implications for the the positions of ice line/colour transitions within the Kuiper Belt’s progenitor populations. ReferencesBannister, M. T., Gladman, B. J., Kavelaars, J. J., et al. 2018, ApJS, 236, 18Lawler, S. M., Kavelaars, J. J., Alexandersen, M., et al. 2018, Front. Astron. Space Sci., 5, 14Nesvorny, D., Vokrouhlicky, D., Alexandersen, M., et al. 2020, AJ, in pressNesvorny, D., & Vokrouhlicky, D. 2016, ApJ, 825Schwamb, M. E., Bannister, M. T., Marsset, M., et al. 2019, ApJS, 243, 12Tegler, S. C., Romanishin, W., Consolmagno, G. J., & J., S. 2016, AJ, 152, 210

The detections of 1I/Oumuamua and 2I/Borisov within just two years demonstrate impressively that interstellar objects (ISOs) must be common in the Milky Way. Once released from their parent system, these ISOs travel for Gyr through interstellar space. While often imagined as empty, interstellar space contains gas and dust most prominent in the form of molecular clouds. Performing numerical simulations, we test how often ISOs cross such molecular clouds. We find that the ISOs pass amazingly often through molecular clouds. In the solar neighbourhood, ISOs typically spend 0.1-0.2% of their journey inside molecular clouds, for relative slow ISOs ($, Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures, accepted by ApJ

International audience; Beyond the giant planets there is a collection of bodies left over from the epoch of planet formation. The objects that are just beyond Neptune are more easily detected than those that journey hundreds of au away; all such highly eccentric objects have been observed inside 150 au. We are interested here in a population of Pluto to Mars-sized planets that were almost certainly present in the early Solar System, some of which may now be stranded in the distant Solar System. Using data from the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS), which covers ~167 square degrees down to r ~25, we searched for objects beyond 300 au using a rarely used search technique. To find such objects we created catalogues of all the sources that were stationary (to the level of the astronomical seeing) in three images taken over 2 h. We then searched for which such 'stationary' objects were not present days/weeks/months before and after. Although other astronomical phenomena (e.g. supernovae) were discovered, no slow moving Solar System object was found. From the null detection and using a survey simulator, we obtain a model-dependent 95% upper limit of ~1000 on the number of 'planetary' objects (with absolute magnitudes, H r

We observed the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov using the Neil Gehrels-Swift Observatory's Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope. We obtained images of the OH gas and dust surrounding the nucleus at six epochs spaced before and after perihelion (-2.56 AU to 2.54 AU). Water production rates increased steadily before perihelion from $(7.0\pm1.5)\times10^{26}$ molecules s$^{-1}$ on Nov. 1, 2019 to $(10.7\pm1.2)\times10^{26}$ molecules s$^{-1}$ on Dec. 1. This rate of increase in water production rate is quicker than that of most dynamically new comets and at the slower end of the wide range of Jupiter-family comets. After perihelion, the water production rate decreased to $(4.9\pm0.9)\times10^{26}$ molecules s$^{-1}$ on Dec. 21, which is much more rapidly than that of all previously observed comets. Our sublimation model constrains the minimum radius of the nucleus to 0.37 km, and indicates an active fraction of at least 55% of the surface. $A(0)f\rho$ calculations show a variation between 57.5 and 105.6 cm with a slight trend peaking before the perihelion, lower than previous and concurrent published values. The observations confirm that 2I/Borisov is carbon-chain depleted and enriched in NH$_2$ relative to water., Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables, submitted to ApJL

Twenty-seven years after the discovery of 1992 QB1 heralded the start of the accelerating exploration of the Trans-Neptunian region, it is useful to consider the manner in which this progress has been made. I present a compilation of the characterization properties of the discovery surveys, both those previously published and those surveys which for various reasons were not present in the literature. This compilation both updates and expands upon the compilation in Kavelaars et al. (2008) . I consider the likely paths of future surveys, together with the need for survey characterization of discovery biases and the advent of increased discovery analysis that uses machine learning.

Observations show that 100-km-class Kuiper belt objects (KBOs) can be divided in (at least) two color groups, hereafter red (R, g-i1.2), reflecting a difference in their surface composition. This is thought to imply that KBOs formed over a relatively wide range of radial distance, r. The cold classicals at 42r*, with 30, Comment: AJ, in press

We present the discovery of 2013 VZ70, the first known horseshoe coorbital companion of Saturn. Observed by the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS) for 4.5 years, the orbit of 2013 VZ70 is determined to high precision, revealing that it currently is in `horseshoe' libration with the planet. This coorbital motion will last at least thousands of years but ends ~10 kyr from now; 2013 VZ70 is thus another example of the already-known `transient coorbital' populations of the giant planets, with this being the first known prograde example for Saturn (temporary retrograde coorbitals are known for Jupiter and Saturn). We present a theoretical steady state model of the scattering population of trans-Neptunian origin in the giant planet region (2--34 au), including the temporary coorbital populations of the four giant planets. We expose this model to observational biases using survey simulations in order to compare the model to the real detections made by a set of well-characterized outer Solar System surveys. While the observed number of coorbitals relative to the scattering population is higher than predicted, we show that the number of observed transient coorbitals of each giant planet relative to each other is consistent with a transneptunian source., 27 pages (double-line spaced manuscript format), 4 figures, 3 tables. Published in The Planetary Science Journal, 2:212 (11pp), 2021 October. Open Access journal article available at https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/PSJ/ac1c6b

The recent discovery of a hundred-kilometer-scale comet, C/2014 UN271 (Bernardinelli-Bernstein), has provoked interest in the activity displayed by such a large body inbound from the Oort cloud. We examine the serendipitous observation of UN271 in long-cadence imaging by the TESS satellite in 2018 and 2020, while Bernardinelli-Bernstein was at 23.8 and 21.3 au, for any notable periodicity. Bernardinelli-Bernstein does not display detectable rotational variability above the noise level in these data.

We present variability measurements and partial light curves of Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNOs) from a two-night pilot study using Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC) on the Subaru Telescope (Maunakea, Hawai'i, USA). Subaru's large aperture (8-m) and HSC's large field of view (1.77 square degrees) allow us to obtain measurements of multiple objects with a range of magnitudes in each telescope pointing. We observed 65 objects with m_r = 22.6--25.5 mag in just six pointings, allowing 20--24 visits of each pointing over the two nights. Our sample, all discovered in the recent Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS), span absolute magnitudes H_r = 6.2--10.8 mag and thus investigates smaller objects than previous light curve projects have typically studied. Our data supports the existence of a correlation between light curve amplitude and absolute magnitude seen in other works, but does not support a correlation between amplitude and orbital inclination. Our sample includes a number of objects from different dynamical populations within the trans-Neptunian region, but we do not find any relationship between variability and dynamical class. We were only able to estimate periods for 12 objects in the sample and found that a longer baseline of observations is required for reliable period analysis. We find that 31 objects (just under half of our sample) have variability greater than 0.4 magnitudes during all of the observations; in smaller 1.25 hr, 1.85 hr and 2.45 hr windows, the median variability is 0.13, 0.16 and 0.19 mags, respectively. The fact that variability on this scale is common for small TNOs has important implications for discovery surveys (such as OSSOS or the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope) and color measurements., Comment: 49 pages, 14 figures, 7 tables