0000000000964366
AUTHOR
Marco Fulle
HST observation of the inner coma of 2060 chiron
Abstract The analysis of persistent comae of very large and distant comets allows us to infer the poorly known physical properties of dust and icy grains produced beyond Jupiter. Chiron is particularly interesting because Fulle ( Astron. Astrophys. 282 , 980–988; 1994) has shown that the strong asymmetricity of its coma (West, Astron. Astrophys. 241 , 635–645 1991) allows us to infer rotational properties of Chiron's nucleus. In this paper we report the observation of the asymmetric inner coma of Chiron from the analysis of 44 images of Chiron and eight images of a standard star available from the HST archive. The images were taken during February/March 1993, when Ch iron was 9.3 AU from th…
Sublimation of icy aggregates in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko detected with the OSIRIS cameras on board Rosetta
Beginning in 2014 March, the OSIRIS (Optical, Spectroscopic, and Infrared Remote Imaging System) cameras began capturing images of the nucleus and coma (gas and dust) of comet 67P/Churyumov¿Gerasimenko using both the wide angle camera (WAC) and the narrow angle camera (NAC). The many observations taken since July of 2014 have been used to study the morphology, location, and temporal variation of the comet's dust jets. We analysed the dust monitoring observations shortly after the southern vernal equinox on 2015 May 30 and 31 with the WAC at the heliocentric distance Rh = 1.53 AU, where it is possible to observe that the jet rotates with the nucleus. We found that the decline of brightness a…