The Energy Budgets of Giant Impacts

Philip J Carter, Simon J Lock, and Sarah T Stewart
JGR: Planets, 125, e06042 (2020).
doi: 10.1029/2019JE006042
https://arxiv.org/abs/1912.04936

Below are animations to accompany selected figures in the paper.
Supplementary materials for the paper can be accessed here. Data from the article are available from dataverse.
Philip J Carter

Figure 1a: Midplane SPH density (top left), near-midplane SPH particle locations where blue particles represent silicate mantle and orange particles represent iron core (bottom left), and energy budget using the participating potential energy (right) for the example canonical Moon-forming impact. The number in the top right corner of the bottom left panel is the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The density is shown using a Delaunay triangulation interpolation, where black regions have densities below the miniumum of the color scale. The images in the left hand panels are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
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Figure 1b: Midplane SPH density (top left), near-midplane SPH particle locations where blue particles represent silicate mantle and orange particles represent iron core (bottom left), and energy budget using the participating potential energy (right) for the similar mass impactors example. The number in the top right corner of the bottom left panel is the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The density is shown using a Delaunay triangulation interpolation, where black regions have densities below the miniumum of the color scale. The images in the left hand panels are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 1c: Midplane SPH density (top left), near-midplane SPH particle locations where blue particles represent silicate mantle and orange particles represent iron core (bottom left), and energy budget using the participating potential energy (right) for the example pre-spinning proto-Earth impact. The number in the top right corner of the bottom left panel is the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The density is shown using a Delaunay triangulation interpolation, where black regions have densities below the miniumum of the color scale. The images in the left hand panels are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 1d: Midplane SPH density (top left), near-midplane SPH particle locations where blue particles represent silicate mantle and orange particles represent iron core (bottom left), and energy budget using the participating potential energy (right) for the example partial accretion impact. The number in the top right corner of the bottom left panel is the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The density is shown using a Delaunay triangulation interpolation, where black regions have densities below the miniumum of the color scale. The images in the left hand panels are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 8a: Midplane specific entropy for the example canonical impact. The number in the top right corner of the panel indicates the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The color scale indicates the entropy of the material, and transparency indicates the density, where the lowest density material is almost entirely transparent. A Delaunay triangulation interpolation has been used to calculate the properties of the materials at all locations. The images are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 8b: Midplane specific entropy for the similar mass impactors example. The number in the top right corner of the panel indicates the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The color scale indicates the entropy of the material, and transparency indicates the density, where the lowest density material is almost entirely transparent. A Delaunay triangulation interpolation has been used to calculate the properties of the materials at all locations. The images are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 8c: Midplane specific entropy for the example pre-spinning proto-Earth impact. The number in the top right corner of the panel indicates the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The color scale indicates the entropy of the material, and transparency indicates the density, where the lowest density material is almost entirely transparent. A Delaunay triangulation interpolation has been used to calculate the properties of the materials at all locations. The images are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"

Figure 8d: Midplane specific entropy for the example partial accretion impact. The number in the top right corner of the panel indicates the time in hours since the start of the simulation. The color scale indicates the entropy of the material, and transparency indicates the density, where the lowest density material is almost entirely transparent. A Delaunay triangulation interpolation has been used to calculate the properties of the materials at all locations. The images are recentered on the gravitational potential minimum of the system.
Download Video: "mp4"