Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Feb 2003
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2003coska..33....5n&link_type=abstract
Contributions of the Astronomical Observatory Skalnaté Pleso, vol. 33, no. 1, p. 5-20.
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
7
Comets, Cometary Nuclei
Scientific paper
The nuclear effective radii of both short-period (practically identical to the Jupiter-family) and long-period comets, as have been determined by many independent authors using several methods, are summarized. Despite the observational selection effects, it is possible to conclude that the observed nuclei of long-period (LP) comets are generally larger than their short-period (SP) counterparts. The average radius of SP-comet (LP-comet) nucleus is 2.3 km (8.9 km). The corresponding average mass of the nucleus is 2 × 1014 . ρ/ρ5 kg (1 × 1016 . ρ/ρ5 kg), where ρ is the mean density of cometary nucleus and ρ5 = 500 kgm-3. Because of the determination uncertainty, the average radius can be a value from interval ranging from 2.1 to 2.7 km (from 7.4 to 9.2 km). The median radius of SP comets is less than about 2 km, whilst that of LP comets is larger than about 4 km. The slope index of cumulative distribution of the observed radii is rather uncertain due to very low-numerous samples of data available. It is probably a value ranging from 2.67 to 3.05 for SP comets and from 1.59 to 2.21 for LP comets.
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