Discrete Element Method Simulation System for Asteroid

Abstract

Asteroid detection is now a hot spot of solar system exploration. The understanding of the evolution of asteroids has a great benefit on researches to the origin of the solar system. An important topic of the evolution research is the evolution of inner structures of asteroids, in other words, asteroids' evolution of shapes and structures under multiple mechanisms. A common method to simulate the dynamical evolution of asteroids is Discrete Element Method (DEM) under the assumption that asteroids are in rubble-pile structures. Some teams have developed several kinds of softwares for DEM simulations. The basics, realization, algorithms of our software “Multi-particle system simulation software based on DEM algorithm” are introduced in this article, and the software is verified using two body collision, sound wave propagation, inner stress of asteroid, and asteroid spin disruption setups.