TRANSIENT FRAGMENTS IN OUTBURSTING COMET 17P/HOLMES {sup ,}
- Department of Earth and Space Sciences, Institute for Geophysics and Planetary Physics, UCLA, 595 Charles Young Drive East, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1567 (United States)
- Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii, 2680 Woodlawn Drive, Honolulu, HI 96822 (United States)
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 find 16 fragments having both spatial distribution and kinematics consistent with isotropic ejection from the nucleus. Photometry of the fragments is inconsistent with scattering from monolithic, inert bodies. Instead, each detected fragment appears to be an active cometesimal producing its own dust coma. By scaling from the coma of the primary nucleus of 17P/Holmes, assumed to be 1.7 km in radius, we infer that the 16 fragments have maximum effective radii between {approx}10 m and {approx}100 m on UT 2007 November 6. The fragments subsequently fade at a common rate of {approx}0.2 mag day{sup -1}, consistent with steady depletion of ices from these bodies in the heat of the Sun. Our characterization of the fragments supports the hypothesis that a large piece of material broke away from the nucleus and crumbled, expelling smaller, icy shards into the larger dust coma around the nucleus.
- OSTI ID:
- 21443098
- Journal Information:
- Astronomical Journal (New York, N.Y. Online), Vol. 139, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1088/0004-6256/139/6/2230; ISSN 1538-3881
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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