The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby

Details The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby

2011-04-22

arxiv.org/abs/1104.4477v1

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

14 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables Accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal Letters

Scientific paper

We report the detection of several emission bands in the CO Fourth Positive Group from comet 103P/Hartley during ultraviolet spectroscopic observations from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) on 2010 November 4 near the time of closest approach by NASA's EPOXI spacecraft. The derived CO/H2O ratio is 0.15-0.45%, which places 103P among the most CO-depleted comets. Apparently this highly volatile species, whose abundance varies by a factor of ~50 among the comets observed to date, does not play a major role in producing the strong and temporally variable activity in 103P/Hartley. The CO emissions varied by ~30% between our two sets of observations, apparently in phase with the temporal variability measured for several gases and dust by other observers. The low absolute abundance of CO in 103P suggests several possibilities: the nucleus formed in a region of the solar nebula that was depleted in CO or too warm to retain much CO ice, repeated passages through the inner solar system have substantially depleted the comet's primordial CO reservoir, or any CO still in the nucleus is buried below the regions that contribute significantly to the coma.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and The Carbon Monoxide Abundance in Comet 103P/Hartley during the EPOXI Flyby will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-330990