Related papers: Formation of Comets
The study of the chemical evolution of gas and dust from pre-stellar dense cores to circumstellar disks around young stars forms an essential part of understanding star- and planet formation. Throughout the collapse- and protostellar…
The gas-driven dust activity of comets is still an unresolved question in cometary science. In the past, it was believed that comets are dirty snowballs and that the dust is ejected when the ice retreats. However, thanks to the various…
The standard model of planet formation considers an initial phase in which planetesimals form from a dust disk, followed by a phase of mutual planetesimal-planetesimal collisions, leading eventually to the formation of planetary embryos.…
Cometary dust particles are best preserved remnants of the matter present at the onset of the formation of the Solar System. Space missions, telescopic observations and laboratory analyses advanced the knowledge on the properties of…
During protoplanetary disk formation, dust grains located in the outer disk retain their pristine icy composition, while solids in the inner stellar-heated disk undergo volatile loss. This process may have left a fossil record in Solar…
Comets are considered as the most primitive objects in the Solar System. Their composition provides information on the composition of the primitive solar nebula, 4.6 Gyr ago. The radio domain is a privileged tool to study the composition of…
We investigate the thermal evolution of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko's subsurface in the Seth_01 region, where active pits have been observed by the ESA/Rosetta mission. Our simulations show that clathrate destabilization and amorphous…
Cometary dust provides a unique window on dust growth mechanisms during the onset of planet formation. Measurements by the Rosetta spacecraft show that the dust in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko has a granular structure at size…
Astronomical observations reveal that protoplanetary disks around young stars commonly have ring- and gap-like structures in their dust distributions. These features are associated with pressure bumps trapping dust particles at specific…
Among the problems yet to be solved by current theories of solar system formation is the origin of the Jupiter-family comets. Several possibilities are examined using a fifth-order Runge-Kutta algorithm.
An outstanding question of astrobiology is the link between the chemical composition of planets, comets, and other solar system bodies and the molecules formed in the interstellar medium. Understanding the chemical and physical evolution of…
Equation of motion for a comet in the Oort cloud is numerically solved. Orbital evolution of the comet under the action of the gravity of the Sun and the Galaxy is presented for various initial conditions. Oscillations of the Sun with…
During the formation of our solar system, a large number of planetesimals were ejected into interstellar space by gravitational encounters with the planets. Debris disks observations and numerical simulations indicate that many other…
The physical properties of cometary nuclei observed today relate to their complex history and help to constrain their formation and evolution. In this article, we review some of the main physical properties of cometary nuclei and focus in…
A 3-D numerical model of comet nuclei is presented. An implicit numerical scheme was developed for the thermal evolution of a spherical nucleus composed of a mixture of ice and dust. The model was tested against analytical solutions,…
Comets provide unique information about the physical and chemical properties of the environment in which the Solar system was formed. Understanding how cometary dust and ice evolve under the effect of sunlight is essential for constraining…
In the late stages of accretion leading up to the formation of planetesimals, particles grew to pebbles the size of 1-mm to tens of cm. That is the same size range that dominates the present-day comet mass loss. Meteoroids that size cause…
Born as ice-rich planetesimals, cometary nuclei were gravitationally scattered onto their current orbits in the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud during the giant planets' dynamical instability in the early stages of our Solar System's…
Earth and Titan are two planetary bodies formed far from each other. Nevertheless the chemical composition of their atmospheres exhibits common indications of being produced by the accretion, plus ulterior in-situ processing of cometary…
This paper presents the past evolution of the orbital elements of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, target of the Rosetta spacecraft. The gravitational orbit of the comet is affected by the sublimation of ice from the nucleus that triggers…