Nongravitational effects and the aging of periodic comets

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Comets, Orbital Lifetime, Astrometry, Comet Nuclei, Gravitational Effects

Scientific paper

A statistical analysis of nongravitational parameters is presented to enhance the understanding of the evolution of cometary nuclei. The present sample is restricted to short-period comets but is otherwise essentially complete up to 1990. Alternative representations of the advance or delay of the time of perihelion passage are introduced on the basis of a simple theory. The nongravitational parameter Delta(P-prime) is found to correlate very well with the parameter E measuring the perihelion asymmetry of the gas production curve over a wide range of perihelion distances, indicating a trend for the nuclei of short-period comets to be less dust-covered and/or to have small mean radius with increasing perihelion distance. It is also found that the largest values of the nongravitational parameters, which generally occur at large perihelion distances, are exclusively connected with comets that have recently undergone large reductions of the perihelion distance. It is concluded that such dynamically young comets have nuclei whose surfaces are more free-sublimating than those of older comets.

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