N-BODY SIMULATIONS OF LATE-STAGE PLANETARY FORMATION WITH A SIMPLE FRAGMENTATION MODEL

We present results of two-dimensional gravitational N-body simulations of the late stage of planetary formation. This stage is characterized by the direct accretion of hundreds of lunar-sized planetesimals into planetary bodies. Our simulation code is based an the Hermite Individ ual Timestep integration algorithm, and gravitational interactions amo ng all bodies are included throughout the simulations. We compare our simulation with earlier works that do not include all interactions, an d we find very good agreement. A previously published collisional frag mentation model is included in our simulation to study the effects of the production of fragments on the subsequent evolution of the larger planetary bodies. It is found that for realistic two-body collisions t hat, according to this model, both bodies will suffer fragmentation, a nd that the outcome of the collision will be a relatively large core c ontaining most of the mass and a few small fragments. We present the r esults of simulations that include this simple fragmentation model. Th ey indicate that the presence of small fragments have only a small eff ect on the growth or orbital evolution of the large planet-sized bodie s. (C) 1998 Academic Press.