Related papers: Comet C/2017 K2 (PANSTARRS): dynamically old or ne…
Comet 3I/ATLAS, also known as C/2025 N1, was discovered on 2025 July 1 UT by NASA Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS), with a v$_{\infty}$ $\sim$ 58 kms$^{-1}$. This is the fastest among the three interstellar objects…
C/1890 F1 Brooks belongs to a group of nineteen comets used by Jan Oort to support his famous hypothesis on the existence of a spherical cloud containing hundreds of billions of comets with orbits of semimajor axes between 50 and 150…
We have determined the dynamical mass of the most luminous stellar cluster known to date, i.e. object W3 in the merger remnant galaxy NGC 7252. The dynamical mass is estimated from the velocity dispersion measured with the high-resolution…
We plot the Secular Light Curves (SLCs) of comets C/2011 L4 Panstarrs and C/2012 S1 ISON. The brightness of C/2011 L4 Panstarrs and C/2012 S1 ISON increase steeply after discovery but both decrease in slope sharply at ~4-5 AU, a…
In recent years a new class of Young Stellar Object has been defined, referred to as dippers, where large transient drops in flux are observed. These dips are too large to be attributed to stellar variability, last from hours to days and…
The complete sample of large-perihelion nearly-parabolic comets discovered during the period 1901-2010 is studied starting from their orbit determination. Next, an orbital evolution that includes three perihelion passages…
Cometary activity may be driven by ices with very low sublimation temperatures, such as carbon monoxide ice, which can sublimate at distances well beyond 20 au. This point is emphasized by the discovery of Oort cloud comet C/2014 UN$_{271}$…
Centaurs are small bodies orbiting in the giant planet region which were scattered inwards from their source populations beyond Neptune. Some members of the population display comet-like activity during their transition through the solar…
The chance discovery of the first interstellar minor body, 1I/2017 U1 (`Oumuamua), indicates that we may have been visited by such objects in the past and that these events may repeat in the future. Unfortunately, minor bodies following…
Comet C2011 J2 (Linear), was discovered to the Catalina Sky Survey Observatory, based on University of Arizona. Is an hyperbolic comet passed to the perihelion at T 2013 Dec. 25.4020 TT. The distance q from the Sun is 3.443732 A.U., that…
Context. Centaurs are icy objects in transition between the transneptunian region and the inner solar system, orbiting the Sun in the giant planet region. Some Centaurs display cometary activity, which cannot be sustained by the sublimation…
Between 1996 and 2003 we have obtained 226 high resolution spectra of 16 stars in the field of the young open cluster NGC 6913, to the aim of constraining its main properties and study its internal kinematics. Twelve of the program stars…
The Orion Nebula Cluster (ONC) is the most massive region of active star formation within a kpc of the Sun. Using Gaia DR3 parallaxes and proper motions, we examine the bulk motions of stars radially and tangentially relative to the cluster…
Comet 2I/Borisov is the first true interstellar comet discovered. Here we present results from observational programs at two Indian observatories, 2 m Himalayan Chandra Telescope at the Indian Astronomical Observatory, Hanle (HCT) and 1.2 m…
We have numerically investigated the long term dynamical behavior of known Centaurs. This class of objects is thought to constitute the transitional population between the Kuiper Belt and the Jupiter-family comets (JFCs). In our study, we…
We report the discovery of a minor planet (2006 SQ372) on an orbit with a perihelion of 24 AU and a semimajor axis of 796 AU. Dynamical simulations show that this is a transient orbit and is unstable on a timescale of 200 Myrs. Falling near…
The unique inner-belt asteroid 311P/PANSTARRS (formerly P/2013 P5) is notable for its sporadic, comet-like ejection of dust in nine distinct epochs spread over $\sim$250 days in 2013. This curious behavior has been interpreted as the…
Kinematic studies of young stars and star clusters have increased our understanding of the process of star formation and evolution in the Milky Way. FU Orionis objects are a specific class of young stellar object notable for their extremely…
The Oort cloud, a collection of icy bodies orbiting the sun at roughly $10^{3}$ AU to $10^{5}$ AU, is believed to be the source of the long-period comets observed in the inner solar system. Although its existence was predicted nearly 70…
We present observations of the disintegrating long-period comet C/2019 J2 (Palomar) taken to determine the nature of the object and the cause of its demise. The data are consistent with break-up of a sub-kilometer nucleus into a debris…