Every year near-Earth object (NEO) surveys discover hundreds of new asteroids, including the potentially hazardous asteroids (PHA). The possibility of impact with the Earth is one of the main motivations to track and study these objects. This paper presents a tether assisted methodology to deflect a PHA by connecting a smaller asteroid, altering the center of mass of the system, and consequently, moving the PHA to a safer orbit. Some of the advantages of this method are that it does not result in fragmentation, which could lead to another problem, and also the flexibility to change the configuration of the system to optimize the deflection according to the warning time. The dynamics of the PHA-tether-asteroid system is analyzed, and the amount of orbit change is determined for several initial conditions. Only motion in the plane of the orbit of the PHA around the Sun is considered, thus the PHA chosen for the simulations has low orbit inclination. Analysis of the dynamics of the system shows that the method is feasible for planetary defense.

中文翻译：

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系留小行星系统以支持行星防御的动力学

每年，近地天体（NEO）调查都会发现数百种新的小行星，包括潜在危险的小行星（PHA）。撞击地球的可能性是追踪和研究这些物体的主要动机之一。本文提出了一种束缚辅助方法，通过连接较小的小行星，改变系统的质心并因此将PHA移至更安全的轨道来偏转PHA。此方法的一些优点是它不会导致碎片化，而这可能导致另一个问题，并且还具有根据警告时间更改系统配置以优化偏转的灵活性。分析了PHA系链小行星系统的动力学，并确定了几种初始条件下的轨道变化量。仅考虑了PHA在围绕太阳的轨道平面内的运动，因此为模拟选择的PHA的轨道倾角较小。对系统动力学的分析表明，该方法对行星防御系统是可行的。