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We performed a monitoring observation of a Jupiter-Family comet, 17P/Holmes, during its 2014 perihelion passage to investigate its secular change in activity. The comet has drawn the attention of astronomers since its historic outburst in…

We present a characterization of the dust environment of long-period comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) by analyzing an extensive dataset, including dust tail images and photometric measurements, from 10 au pre-perihelion to 1.6 au…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2025-04-03 Fernando Moreno , Charlotte Goetz , Francisco J. Aceituno , Victor Casanova , Alfredo Sota , Pablo Santos-Sanz

On July 28, 2006 the 6-m telescope of the Special Astrophysical Observatory of the Russian Academy of Sciences recorded the spectrum of a faint meteor. We confidently identify the lines of FeI and MgI, OI, NI and molecular-nitrogen N_2…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-13 V. L. Afanasiev , V. V. Kalenichenko , I. D. Karachentsev

Hubble Space Telescope observations of interstellar comet 2I/Borisov near perihelion show the ejection of large (>~100 um) particles at <~9 m/s speeds, with estimated mass-loss rates of ~35 kg/s. The total mass loss from comet Borisov…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2020-06-10 Yoonyoung Kim , David Jewitt , Max Mutchler , Jessica Agarwal , Man-To Hui , Harold Weaver

We report on the discovery and analysis of a striking neutral sodium gas tail associated with comet C/1995 O1 Hale-Bopp. Sodium D-line emission has been observed at heliocentric distance r<1.4 AU in some long-period comets and the presence…

We identify a sample of 27 long-period comets for which both non-gravitational accelerations and Lyman-alpha based gas production rates are available. Seven of the 27 comets (i.e. 25 percent) did not survive perihelion because of nucleus…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2022-10-05 David Jewitt

Comet 133P/Elst-Pizarro is the first-known and currently best-characterised member of the main-belt comets, a recently-identified class of objects that exhibit cometary activity but which are dynamically indistinguishable from main-belt…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2015-05-14 Henry H. Hsieh , David Jewitt , Pedro Lacerda , Stephen C. Lowry , Colin Snodgrass

We describe active asteroid 331P/Gibbs (2012 F5) using archival Hubble Space Telescope data taken between 2015 and 2018. 331P is an outer main-belt active asteroid with a long-lived debris trail that formed in 2011. Embedded in the debris…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2021-12-08 David Jewitt , Jing Li , Yoonyoung Kim

The striations in the dust tails of comets are referred to as striae, and their origin has long been a mystery. We introduce a new dynamic model to describe the forms of the striae observed in comets Hale-Bopp (C/1995 O1), West (C/1975 V1),…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2025-12-12 Kimihiko Nishioka

Comet C/2013 A1 (siding Spring) will experience a high velocity encounter with Mars on October 19, 2014 at a distance of 135,000 km +- 5000 km from the planet center. We present a comprehensive analysis of the trajectory of both the comet…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2015-06-19 Davide Farnocchia , Steven R. Chesley , Paul W. Chodas , Pasquale Tricarico , Michael S. P. Kelley , Tony L. Farnham

This paper reports a new optical observation of 17P/Holmes one orbital period after the historical outburst event in 2007. We detected not only a common dust tail near the nucleus, but also a long narrow structure that extended along the…

We present the first good evidence for exocomet transits of a host star in continuum light in data from the Kepler mission. The Kepler star in question, KIC 3542116, is of spectral type F2V and is quite bright at K_p = 10. The transits have…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2018-01-24 S. Rappaport , A. Vanderburg , T. Jacobs , D. LaCourse , J. Jenkins , A. Kraus , A. Rizzuto , D. W. Latham , A. Bieryla , M. Lazarevic , A. Schmitt

We present results from a wide-field imaging campaign at the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope to study the spectacular outburst of comet 17P/Holmes in late 2007. Using image-processing techniques we probe inside the spherical dust coma and…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2015-05-18 Rachel Stevenson , Jan Kleyna , David Jewitt

Intrinsically faint comets in nearly-parabolic orbits with perihelion distances much smaller than 1 AU exhibit strong propensity for suddenly disintegrating at a time not long before perihelion, as shown by Bortle (1991). Evidence from…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2019-01-31 Zdenek Sekanina

We report results from broadband visible images of comet C/2012 S1 (ISON) obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope Wide Field Camera 3 on 2013 April 10. C/ISON's coma brightness follows a 1/{\rho} (where {\rho} is the projected distance…

The recent close approach of comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) allowed us to study the morphology of its inner coma. From the measurement of the dust ejection velocityon spiral structures expanding around the nucleus, we estimated a mean…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2021-09-07 F. Manzini , V. Oldani , P. Ochner , E. Barbotin , L. R. Bedin , R. Behrend , G. Fardelli

We have evaluated the spatial distribution of dust in disks supplied by colliding or evaporating bodies spread in a small belt. The gradient of the distribution of dust expelled by radiation pressure is generally steeper than the one…

Astrophysics · Physics 2016-08-30 A. Lecavelier des Etangs , A. Vidal-Madjar , R. Ferlet

We present results from our 47-night imaging campaign of Comet 41P/Tuttle-Giacobini-Kresak conducted from Lowell Observatory between 2017 February 16 and July 2. Coma morphology revealed gas jets, whose appearance and motion as a function…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2019-02-20 David G. Schleicher , Matthew M. Knight , Nora L. Eisner , Audrey Thirouin

The dust disks observed around mature stars are evidence that plantesimals are present in these systems on spatial scales that are similar to that of the asteroids and the KBOs in the Solar System. These dust disks (a.k.a. ``debris disks'')…

Astrophysics · Physics 2007-05-23 Amaya Moro-Martin , Mark C. Wyatt , Renu Malhotra , David E. Trilling

We present the results of observations of asteroid (248370) QN$_{173}$ obtained during July 2021 - January 2022 with three telescopes. Our analysis revealed the presence of the dust tail for about half of a year. The direct images of the…