High-drag Interstellar Objects and Galactic Dynamical Streams

Abstract

The nature of 1I/’Oumuamua (henceforth, 1I), the first interstellar object (ISO) known to pass through the solar system, remains mysterious. Feng & Jones noted that the incoming 1I velocity vector “at infinity” ( ) is close to the motion of the Pleiades dynamical stream (or Local Association), and suggested that 1I is a young object ejected from a star in that stream. Micheli et al. subsequently detected nongravitational acceleration in the 1I trajectory; this acceleration would not be unusual in an active comet, but 1I observations failed to reveal any signs of activity. Bialy & Loeb hypothesized that the anomalous 1I acceleration was instead due to radiation pressure, which would require an extremely low mass-to-area ratio (or area density). Here I show that a low area density can also explain the very close kinematic association of 1I and the Pleiades stream, as it renders 1I subject to drag capture by interstellar gas clouds. This supports the radiation pressure hypothesis and suggests that there is a significant population of low area density ISOs in the Galaxy, leading, through gas drag, to enhanced ISO concentrations in the galactic dynamical streams. Any ISO entrained in a dynamical stream will have a predictable incoming targeted deep surveys using this information should be able to find dynamical stream objects from months to as much as a year before their perihelion, providing the lead time needed for fast-response missions for the future in situ exploration of such objects.