The occurence of interstellar meteoroids in the vicinity of the Earth

Abstract

If interstellar meteors are present among the registered meteor orbits, the distribution of the excesses of their heliocentric velocities should correspond to the distribution of radial velocities of close stars. Hence, for the velocity v_i = 20 kms⁻¹ of an interstellar meteor (with respect to the Sun) we obtain a heliocentric velocity v_H = 46.6 kms⁻¹ of an interstellar meteor arriving at the Earth. Moreover, a concentration of radiants to the Sun's apex should be observed. An analysis of the hyperbolic meteors among the 4581 photographic orbits of the IAU Meteor Data Center showed that the identification of the vast majority of the hyperbolic orbits in these catalogues has been caused by an erroneous determination of their heliocentric velocity and/or other parameters. Any error in the determination of v_H, especially near the parabolic limit, can create an artificial hyperbolic orbit that does not really exist. On the basis of photographic meteors from the IAU MDC, the proportion of possible interstellar meteors decreased significantly (greater than 1 order of magnitude) after error analysis and does not exceed the value 2.5 × 10⁻⁴. Neither any concentration of radiants to the Sun's apex, nor any distribution following the motion of interstellar material has been found.