Determining the Rotational Phase of Comet 9P/Tempel 1 in Support of the StardustNExT Mission

Details Determining the Rotational Phase of Comet 9P/Tempel 1 in Support of the StardustNExT Mission Determining the Rotational Phase of Comet 9P/Tempel 1 in Support of the StardustNExT Mission

Jul 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008hst..prop11998m&link_type=abstract

HST Proposal ID #11998. Cycle 17

Computer Science

Scientific paper

A primary objective of the StardustNExT mission is to image the crater created by NASA's Deep Impact {DI} mission. The 12-year ground- and space-based DI observing campaign provided an exceptional data set for investigating the rotation of comet 9P/Tempel 1. The just-completed analysis shows that the spin period increased in a stepwise manner through the perihelia in 2000 and 2005, due to an outgassing of water from a southern jet. Our water-sublimation jet torque model has been moderately successful in predicting the integrated change in the nucleus longitude at the 2005 perihelion and beyond, and has been used to predict the rotation state at the planned Stardust-NExT encounter just after perihelion on 2/14/2011. We propose a 19-orbit Hubble program to perform light curve observations of 9P/Tempel 1 that will allow us to determine the time-of-arrival adjustment of the Stardust-NExT spacecraft trajectory that is needed to ensure that the spacecraft arrives at encounter with the {as yet unseen} artificial DI crater at the sub-spacecraft point and fully illuminated by the sun. The trajectory correction maneuver is in Feb 2010, and we need to know the nucleus rotation phase to a precision of 1% and the period to 10 sec by Jan 2010. HST is the only facility capable of obtaining the high quality data necessary to determine the shape and phase of the rotational light curve. When combined with ground-based data 2-3 months later, we will achieve the required precision.;

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