Related papers: Are 2I/Borisov and Oort Cloud Comets Alike?
In recent years, the topic of existence and exploration of exocomets has been gaining increasing attention. The asymmetrical decrease in the stellar brightness due to the passage of a comet-like object in front of the star was successfully…
We present polarization images of Comet ISON (C/2012 S1) taken with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) on UTC 2013 May 8 (rh = 3.81 AU, Delta = 4.34 AU), when the phase angle was alpha = 12.16 degrees. This phase angle is approximately…
We have studied optical properties of interstellar dust around the Orion A molecular cloud to investigate the size distribution and the composition of dust grains. Orion A is one of the most studied molecular clouds in the solar vicinity…
The solar system's Zodiacal Cloud is visible to the unaided eye, yet the origin of its constituent dust particles is not well understood, with a wide range of proposed divisions between sources in the asteroid belt and Jupiter Family…
Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) has provided an unprecedented opportunity to observe a bright comet over a wide range of heliocentric distances. We present here Spitzer Space Telescope observations of Hale-Bopp from 2005 and 2008 that show a…
A thin, bright dust cloud, which is associated with the Rosetta mission target object (67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko), was observed after the 2002 perihelion passage. The neckline structure or dust trail nature of this cloud is controversial.…
When viewed from Earth, most of what we observe of a comet is dust. The influence of solar radiation pressure on the trajectories of dust particles depends on their cross-section to mass ratio. Hence solar radiation pressure acts like a…
During its sungrazing perihelion passage, comet ISON appeared in the field of view of the SUMER spectrometer and allowed unique observations at far-ultraviolet wavelengths with high spatial and temporal resolution. We report results of…
We have carried out wide-field (0.17 degree^2) and high-angular resolution (21.3 arcsec ~ 0.04 pc) observations in [CI] line toward the Orion-A giant molecular cloud with the Atacama Submillimeter Telescope Experiment (ASTE) 10 m telescope…
We report the detection of the nucleus of interstellar object 3I/ATLAS, using a nucleus extraction technique on Hubble Space Telescope (HST) observations taken between December 2025 and January 2026. The product of the V-band geometric…
Remote investigations of the ancient solar system matter has been traditionally carried out through the observations of long-period (LP) comets that are less affected by solar irradiation than the short-period counterparts orbiting much…
The population of comets hosted by the Oort cloud is heterogeneous. Most studies in this area focused on highly active objects, those with small perihelion distances or examples of objects with peculiar physical properties and/or unusual…
We report the first IR proper motion measurements of the Herbig-Haro objects in the Orion Molecular Cloud--One using a four-year time baseline. The [Fe II] emitting bullets are moving of order 0.08 arcsec per year, or at about 170 \kms. The…
Comets display with decreasing solar distance an increased emission of gas and dust particles, leading to the formation of the coma and tail. Spacecraft missions provide insight in the temporal and spatial variations of the dust and gas…
Determining temperatures in molecular clouds from ratios of CO rotational lines or from ratios of continuum emission in different wavelength bands suffers from reduced temperature sensitivity in the high-temperature limit. In theory, the…
China's Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter successfully imaged the third interstellar object, 3I/ATLAS, during its close encounter with Mars using the onboard HiRIC CMOS camera. This is China's first deep-space observation of an astronomical object.…
We have studied the opacity of dust grains at submillimeter wavelengths by estimating the optical depth from imaging at 160, 250, 350, and 500 um from the Herschel Gould Belt Survey and comparing this to a column density obtained from the…
Hubble Space Telescope observations of main-belt comet P/2013 P5 reveal an extraordinary system of six dust tails that distinguish this object from any other. Observations two weeks apart show dramatic morphological change in the tails…
The reliability of modeling the far-IR continuum to 13CO J=1-0 spectral line ratios applied to the Orion clouds (Wall 2006) is tested by applying the models to simulated data. The two-component models are found to give the dust-gas…
We measured organic volatiles (CH4, CH3OH, C2H6, H2CO), CO, and water in comet 8P/Tuttle, a comet from the Oort cloud reservoir now in a short-period Halley-type orbit. We compare its composition with two other comets in Halley-type orbits,…