The Anti-Tail of Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) in 1997/1998

Computer Science

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

Comet C/1995 O1 Hale-Bopp, Anti-Tail, Neck-Line Structure, Mm-Size Dust

Scientific paper

The large-scale post-perihelion evolution of the dust tail in Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) was monitored with Schmidt telescope exposures at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) La Silla in Chile. In early October 1997 signatures of a peculiar dust-tail appeared as straight, but diffuse extensions in the northern and southern coma hemisphere. With the approach of the Earth to the orbital plane of the comet a needle-like anti-tail with a similar, but much longer counterpart in the region of the normal dust tail formed. In early January 1998, i.e., close to the plane crossing, the anti-tail pointed towards position angle 190° and was at least 0.4° long, its counter part extended over more than 5° into opposite direction. During February and March 1998 the position angles of both features increased by more than 40$° - while their appearance became shorter, wider and more diffuse again. The peculiar dust tail was last observed in April 1998. Modeling of the dust tail dynamics shows that the anti-tail and peculiar tail phenomenon observed is formed by a neck-line structure of heavy dust grains released around perihelion passage. Two scenarii are introduced to explain the extension of the anti-tail feature: (1) grains ejected about 20 days post-perihelion with a initial velocity of ~170 m/s in radial direction towards the Sun and (2) grains released about 60-80 days before perihelion at a speed of ~70m/s into the orbital plane and against the motion direction of the comet. The out-of-plane velocity component of the dust was less than ~25 m/s. Both scenarios require dust of β < 0.001 to be involved, i.e., grains of at least mm-size. The rather symmetric shading of the neck-line structure before and after passage of the Earth through the orbital plane of the comet in early January 1998 supports the idea that dust of both scenarii may have contributed to the phenomenon.

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

The Anti-Tail of Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) in 1997/1998 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 Anti-Tail of Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) in 1997/1998, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and The Anti-Tail of Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) in 1997/1998 will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1152605

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.