Physical Evolution of Comets and Cometary Dust

Details Physical Evolution of Comets and Cometary Dust Physical Evolution of Comets and Cometary Dust

Mar 2003

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2003sptz.prop.1095f&link_type=abstract

Spitzer Proposal ID #1095

Physics

Scientific paper

Through the SIRTF Fellowship program, I will be studying the physical evolution of comets. This includes: understanding the thermal and optical properties of the surfaces of the nuclei, the behavior of the active regions, and the characteristics of the cometary dust grains. I will be observing comets from various dynamical classes: comets on their first trip from the Oort Cloud, Centaur-comets migrating in from the Kuiper Belt, highly-evolved short-period comets in the inner Solar System, and extinct-comet candidates. Since it is difficult to observe the aging of a comet in real time -- comets are active for 10^4 to 10^5 years and require 10^5 to 10^6 years to be perturbed into significantly different orbits -- understanding the life cycle of a comet is best achieved by looking at many comets from different dynamical families. The ultimate scientific goal is to place the comets in their proper context within the framework of Solar System formation and evolution.

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