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NASAStardust Mission - Encounter with Comet Tempel 1 - Live India
Dear Freinds in addition to series of articles below here is information about Spacecraft, target objects etc... along with live video stream of NASA.
Spacecraft : The Stardust spacecraft will have logged more than 5,673,464,575 kilometers (3,525,327,446 miles) and over a dozen years traveling in deep space by the time the Tempel 1 encounter is complete. Back when it launched in 1999, Stardust carried onboard some of the most innovative, state-of-the-art technologies pioneered by other recent missions. It combined this state-of-the-art technology with a combination of off- the-shelf spacecraft components and, in some cases, spare parts and instrumentation left over from previous successful space missions. The Stardust spacecraft is derived from a rectangular deep-space bus called SpaceProbe developed by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver. The main bus is 1.7 meters (5.6 feet) high, 0.66 meter (2.16 feet) wide and 0.66 meter (2.16 feet) deep, about the size of an average office desk. Panels are made of a core of aluminum honeycomb, with outer layers of graphite fibers and polycyanate face sheets. With its two parallel solar panels deployed, the spacecraft takes on the shape of a letter H. There are three dedicated science packages on Stardust -- the two-sided Dust Collector, the Comet and Interstellar Dust Analyzer, and the Dust Flux Monitor. Science data are also being obtained without dedicated hardware. The navigation camera, for example, provides images of its cometary target for both targeting accuracy and scientific analysis.
Dimensions: Main structure 1.7 meters (5.6 feet) high, 0.66 meters (2.16 feet) wide, 0.66 meters (2.16 feet) deep; length of solar arrays 4.8 meters (15.9 feet) tip to tip Weight: 385 kilograms (848 pounds) total at launch, consisting of 254-kilogram (560-pound) spacecraft and 46-kilogram (101-pound) return capsule, and 85 kilograms (187 pounds) of fuel Weight total as of Feb. 3, 2011: 256.6 kg (565.7 lbs) total, consisting of 254-kilogram (560-pound) spacecraft and 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of fuel. Power: Solar panels providing from 170 to 800 watts, depending on distance from the sun.
TARGET :
Comet Tempel 1 Official designation: 9P/Tempel. It is a periodic comet discovered by Wilhelm Tempel on April 3, 1867. Tempel 1's orbit lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The comet orbits the sun every 5.5 years. The comet's orbital period has varied in the past and will do so in the future because of close approaches with the planet Jupiter. Nucleus shape: Elongated, irregular. Nucleus size: 7.6 and 4.9 kilometers (4.7 and 3 miles) with an equivalent radius of about 3 kilometers. Nucleus mass: approximately 40 trillion kilograms (88.2 billion tons). Nucleus rotation period: about 41.9 hours.
Tempel 1 was previously visited by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft on July 4, 2005.
Stardust-NExT mission
Total distance traveled from Earth (since drop off of sample return capsule in 2006) to comet Tempel 1: 1.04 billion kilometers (646 million miles). Total distance Stardust spacecraft has traveled since 1999 launch (Earth to comet Wild 2 to Earth to comet Tempel 1): about 5.7 billion kilometers (3.5 billion miles). Spacecraft speed relative to comet Tempel 1 at time of closest approach: 10.9 kilometers per second (6.77 miles per second/24,300 miles per hour). Distance of spacecraft (and comet) from Earth at time of encounter: 336 million kilometers (209 million miles).
Program : Stardust-NExT (extended mission) costs: $29 million (FY 2010), for operations from 2007 to end of project at the end of fiscal year 2011.
Science Comet Tempel 1 – A History
Even before the Deep Impact and Stardust-NExT mission, comet Tempel 1 was already one of the most analyzed of the Jupiter-family comets. A Jupiter-family comet is one whose orbit has been modified by close passages to Jupiter and has an orbital period less than 20 years. With the completion of the Stardust-NExT flyby, comet Tempel 1 will be by far the most-scrutinized comet in history. Tempel 1's orbit lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The comet orbits the sun every 5.5 years. The comet's orbital period has varied in the past and will do so in the future because of its close approaches with the planet Jupiter. Tempel 1 is remarkably homogeneous in albedo, or reflectivity, and color. The surface is very dark, reflecting less than five percent of the sunlight that falls on it. Deep Impact identified very few places where water ice is exposed. The comet is oblate and irregular in shape. The nucleus size is 7.6 and 4.9 kilometers (4.7 and 3 miles) with an equivalent radius of about 3 kilometers (1.9 miles). The comet’s period of rotation is about 41.85 hours. Tempel 1 was first seen close up on July 4, 2005, when NASA's Deep Impact mission performed its encounter. The Deep Impact mission consisted of functionally two spacecraft: an impacting spacecraft, and a flyby spacecraft for observing the impact and relaying data from the impactor back to Earth. In reality the mission's impactor was "run over" by the comet at a closing speed of 37,100 kilometers per hour (23,000 miles per hour). Deep Impact's impactor struck the nucleus obliquely and excavated a crater predicted to be in the range of 100 to 300 meters (328 to 984 feet) across. The crater was not directly observed by Deep Impact due to the large amount of fine dust ejected by the impact. The obscuring ejecta were dominated by particles in the diameter range from 1 to 100 micrometers (a single strand of hair usually has a diameter of 20 to 180 micrometers). The resulting ejecta cone appeared to remain attached to the comet’s surface, indicating that formation of the crater was controlled by gravity rather than by material strength. Deep Impact high-resolution images cover about 30 percent of the nucleus at less than 10 meters per pixel (about 33 feet per pixel). A region about 2 kilometers (1.3 miles) across was imaged at slightly better resolution by the impactor camera shortly before it impacted there. The nucleus images reveal several regions of distinct morphology, suggesting considerable variation in exposed materials, geologic processes and ages. Two different areas display several dozen apparently circular features, ranging from 40 to 400 meters (131 to 1,312 feet) in diameter. Although the size distribution of these features is consistent with that of an impact crater population, whether these features are indeed impact craters or sublimation pits remains uncertain.
Two regions of smooth surface were revealed by Deep Impact images. Both smooth areas are in gravitational lows. The smoothness is reminiscent of the plateau seen on comet Borrelly, but the surroundings are different. There is circumstantial evidence that the smooth deposits may be associated with either recent or currently active regions on the nucleus.
Stardust-NExT Science Objectives The purpose of the Stardust-NExT mission is to expand the knowledge of comets by flying a spacecraft through the coma of comet Tempel 1 and imaging its nucleus. It is a low-cost mission that will expand the investigation of comet Tempel 1 initiated by Deep Impact in 2005, and, for the first time, assess the changes in the surface of a comet between two successive orbits around the sun. Stardust-NExT will also provide important new information on how Jupiter-family comets evolve and how they were put together. Stardust-NExT also provides NASA with a unique opportunity to study two entirely different comets with the same instrument. By doing this, scientists will be able to more accurately compare its existing data set.
On February 14, 2011, at a projected distance of 200 kilometers (124 miles), the Stardust-NExT spacecraft will obtain high-resolution images of the coma and nucleus, as well as measurements of the composition, size distribution and density of dust emitted into the coma. Additionally, Stardust-NExT will update the data gathered in 2005 by the Deep Impact mission on the rotational phase of the comet.
The official primary science objectives of the mission are as follows:
• To extend our understanding of the processes that affect the surfaces of comet nuclei by documenting the changes that have occurred on comet Tempel 1 between two successive perihelion passages, or orbits around the sun.
• To extend the geologic mapping of the nucleus of Tempel 1 to elucidate the extent and nature of layering, and help refine models of the formation and structure of comet nuclei.
• To extend the study of smooth flow deposits, active areas and known exposure of water ice.
Other Science Objectives:
• If possible, to characterize the crater produced by Deep Impact in July 2005, to better understand the structure and mechanical properties of cometary nuclei and elucidate crater formation processes on them.
• Measure the density and mass distribution of dust particles within the coma using the Dust Flux Monitor Instrument instrument.
• Analyze the composition of dust particles within the coma using the Comet and Interstellar Dust Analyzer instrument.
The main objective of the experiment is to obtain high-resolution images to address mission goals. At the nominal flyby distance of 200 kilometers (124 miles), high-resolution imaging of the nucleus at scales as fine as 12 meters (39 feet) per pixel will be obtained. Coma and jet imaging may also be obtained on departure.
Many features of interest seen in the Deep Impact images, such as layers, flows, active areas and exposed ice, have details of interest at spatial scales that are equal to or smaller than 200 meters (660 feet) across.
Imaging the Deep Impact Generated Crater
A secondary science objective of the mission is to image, if possible, the Deep Impact crater with sufficient spatial resolution to determine its size, shape, degree of layering and ejecta pattern. Such an achievement would be an added bonus to the huge amount of data that mission scientists expect to obtain. Imaging the crater generated by Deep Impact requires that the comet's face, which includes the crater, be in sunshine and facing the spacecraft during encounter. If this occurs, and the crater is imaged, the observation would be the first ever of a crater created by a human-made impact on a cometary surface.
Imagery obtained of the Deep Impact crater could provide scientists with a better characterization of the surface material that composes comet Tempel 1. The morphology of the crater may provide evidence of surface layering. The form, extent and visibility of the impact ejecta blanket could provide a benchmark for identifying impact craters and ejecta blankets on cometary surfaces, and improve understanding of their material properties. Observations of the crater ejecta would also show what relatively fresh, excavated sub- surface material looks like compared to older surfaces on the comet. To image the Deep Impact-generated crater requires comet Tempel 1 to put its best face forward during time of closest approach. Conversely, if the imagery from the flyby reveals a different face of Tempel 1 -- the side that does not include the crater generated during the Deep Impact mission -- scientists will be able to further extend the geologic mapping of the comet's nucleus and obtain a better understanding of the formation and structure of comet nuclei surface features.
Spacecraft : The Stardust spacecraft will have logged more than 5,673,464,575 kilometers (3,525,327,446 miles) and over a dozen years traveling in deep space by the time the Tempel 1 encounter is complete. Back when it launched in 1999, Stardust carried onboard some of the most innovative, state-of-the-art technologies pioneered by other recent missions. It combined this state-of-the-art technology with a combination of off- the-shelf spacecraft components and, in some cases, spare parts and instrumentation left over from previous successful space missions. The Stardust spacecraft is derived from a rectangular deep-space bus called SpaceProbe developed by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver. The main bus is 1.7 meters (5.6 feet) high, 0.66 meter (2.16 feet) wide and 0.66 meter (2.16 feet) deep, about the size of an average office desk. Panels are made of a core of aluminum honeycomb, with outer layers of graphite fibers and polycyanate face sheets. With its two parallel solar panels deployed, the spacecraft takes on the shape of a letter H. There are three dedicated science packages on Stardust -- the two-sided Dust Collector, the Comet and Interstellar Dust Analyzer, and the Dust Flux Monitor. Science data are also being obtained without dedicated hardware. The navigation camera, for example, provides images of its cometary target for both targeting accuracy and scientific analysis.
Dimensions: Main structure 1.7 meters (5.6 feet) high, 0.66 meters (2.16 feet) wide, 0.66 meters (2.16 feet) deep; length of solar arrays 4.8 meters (15.9 feet) tip to tip Weight: 385 kilograms (848 pounds) total at launch, consisting of 254-kilogram (560-pound) spacecraft and 46-kilogram (101-pound) return capsule, and 85 kilograms (187 pounds) of fuel Weight total as of Feb. 3, 2011: 256.6 kg (565.7 lbs) total, consisting of 254-kilogram (560-pound) spacecraft and 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of fuel. Power: Solar panels providing from 170 to 800 watts, depending on distance from the sun.
TARGET :
Comet Tempel 1 Official designation: 9P/Tempel. It is a periodic comet discovered by Wilhelm Tempel on April 3, 1867. Tempel 1's orbit lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The comet orbits the sun every 5.5 years. The comet's orbital period has varied in the past and will do so in the future because of close approaches with the planet Jupiter. Nucleus shape: Elongated, irregular. Nucleus size: 7.6 and 4.9 kilometers (4.7 and 3 miles) with an equivalent radius of about 3 kilometers. Nucleus mass: approximately 40 trillion kilograms (88.2 billion tons). Nucleus rotation period: about 41.9 hours.
Tempel 1 was previously visited by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft on July 4, 2005.
Stardust-NExT mission
Total distance traveled from Earth (since drop off of sample return capsule in 2006) to comet Tempel 1: 1.04 billion kilometers (646 million miles). Total distance Stardust spacecraft has traveled since 1999 launch (Earth to comet Wild 2 to Earth to comet Tempel 1): about 5.7 billion kilometers (3.5 billion miles). Spacecraft speed relative to comet Tempel 1 at time of closest approach: 10.9 kilometers per second (6.77 miles per second/24,300 miles per hour). Distance of spacecraft (and comet) from Earth at time of encounter: 336 million kilometers (209 million miles).
Program : Stardust-NExT (extended mission) costs: $29 million (FY 2010), for operations from 2007 to end of project at the end of fiscal year 2011.
Science Comet Tempel 1 – A History
Even before the Deep Impact and Stardust-NExT mission, comet Tempel 1 was already one of the most analyzed of the Jupiter-family comets. A Jupiter-family comet is one whose orbit has been modified by close passages to Jupiter and has an orbital period less than 20 years. With the completion of the Stardust-NExT flyby, comet Tempel 1 will be by far the most-scrutinized comet in history. Tempel 1's orbit lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The comet orbits the sun every 5.5 years. The comet's orbital period has varied in the past and will do so in the future because of its close approaches with the planet Jupiter. Tempel 1 is remarkably homogeneous in albedo, or reflectivity, and color. The surface is very dark, reflecting less than five percent of the sunlight that falls on it. Deep Impact identified very few places where water ice is exposed. The comet is oblate and irregular in shape. The nucleus size is 7.6 and 4.9 kilometers (4.7 and 3 miles) with an equivalent radius of about 3 kilometers (1.9 miles). The comet’s period of rotation is about 41.85 hours. Tempel 1 was first seen close up on July 4, 2005, when NASA's Deep Impact mission performed its encounter. The Deep Impact mission consisted of functionally two spacecraft: an impacting spacecraft, and a flyby spacecraft for observing the impact and relaying data from the impactor back to Earth. In reality the mission's impactor was "run over" by the comet at a closing speed of 37,100 kilometers per hour (23,000 miles per hour). Deep Impact's impactor struck the nucleus obliquely and excavated a crater predicted to be in the range of 100 to 300 meters (328 to 984 feet) across. The crater was not directly observed by Deep Impact due to the large amount of fine dust ejected by the impact. The obscuring ejecta were dominated by particles in the diameter range from 1 to 100 micrometers (a single strand of hair usually has a diameter of 20 to 180 micrometers). The resulting ejecta cone appeared to remain attached to the comet’s surface, indicating that formation of the crater was controlled by gravity rather than by material strength. Deep Impact high-resolution images cover about 30 percent of the nucleus at less than 10 meters per pixel (about 33 feet per pixel). A region about 2 kilometers (1.3 miles) across was imaged at slightly better resolution by the impactor camera shortly before it impacted there. The nucleus images reveal several regions of distinct morphology, suggesting considerable variation in exposed materials, geologic processes and ages. Two different areas display several dozen apparently circular features, ranging from 40 to 400 meters (131 to 1,312 feet) in diameter. Although the size distribution of these features is consistent with that of an impact crater population, whether these features are indeed impact craters or sublimation pits remains uncertain.
Two regions of smooth surface were revealed by Deep Impact images. Both smooth areas are in gravitational lows. The smoothness is reminiscent of the plateau seen on comet Borrelly, but the surroundings are different. There is circumstantial evidence that the smooth deposits may be associated with either recent or currently active regions on the nucleus.
Stardust-NExT Science Objectives The purpose of the Stardust-NExT mission is to expand the knowledge of comets by flying a spacecraft through the coma of comet Tempel 1 and imaging its nucleus. It is a low-cost mission that will expand the investigation of comet Tempel 1 initiated by Deep Impact in 2005, and, for the first time, assess the changes in the surface of a comet between two successive orbits around the sun. Stardust-NExT will also provide important new information on how Jupiter-family comets evolve and how they were put together. Stardust-NExT also provides NASA with a unique opportunity to study two entirely different comets with the same instrument. By doing this, scientists will be able to more accurately compare its existing data set.
On February 14, 2011, at a projected distance of 200 kilometers (124 miles), the Stardust-NExT spacecraft will obtain high-resolution images of the coma and nucleus, as well as measurements of the composition, size distribution and density of dust emitted into the coma. Additionally, Stardust-NExT will update the data gathered in 2005 by the Deep Impact mission on the rotational phase of the comet.
The official primary science objectives of the mission are as follows:
• To extend our understanding of the processes that affect the surfaces of comet nuclei by documenting the changes that have occurred on comet Tempel 1 between two successive perihelion passages, or orbits around the sun.
• To extend the geologic mapping of the nucleus of Tempel 1 to elucidate the extent and nature of layering, and help refine models of the formation and structure of comet nuclei.
• To extend the study of smooth flow deposits, active areas and known exposure of water ice.
Other Science Objectives:
• If possible, to characterize the crater produced by Deep Impact in July 2005, to better understand the structure and mechanical properties of cometary nuclei and elucidate crater formation processes on them.
• Measure the density and mass distribution of dust particles within the coma using the Dust Flux Monitor Instrument instrument.
• Analyze the composition of dust particles within the coma using the Comet and Interstellar Dust Analyzer instrument.
The main objective of the experiment is to obtain high-resolution images to address mission goals. At the nominal flyby distance of 200 kilometers (124 miles), high-resolution imaging of the nucleus at scales as fine as 12 meters (39 feet) per pixel will be obtained. Coma and jet imaging may also be obtained on departure.
Many features of interest seen in the Deep Impact images, such as layers, flows, active areas and exposed ice, have details of interest at spatial scales that are equal to or smaller than 200 meters (660 feet) across.
Imaging the Deep Impact Generated Crater
A secondary science objective of the mission is to image, if possible, the Deep Impact crater with sufficient spatial resolution to determine its size, shape, degree of layering and ejecta pattern. Such an achievement would be an added bonus to the huge amount of data that mission scientists expect to obtain. Imaging the crater generated by Deep Impact requires that the comet's face, which includes the crater, be in sunshine and facing the spacecraft during encounter. If this occurs, and the crater is imaged, the observation would be the first ever of a crater created by a human-made impact on a cometary surface.
Imagery obtained of the Deep Impact crater could provide scientists with a better characterization of the surface material that composes comet Tempel 1. The morphology of the crater may provide evidence of surface layering. The form, extent and visibility of the impact ejecta blanket could provide a benchmark for identifying impact craters and ejecta blankets on cometary surfaces, and improve understanding of their material properties. Observations of the crater ejecta would also show what relatively fresh, excavated sub- surface material looks like compared to older surfaces on the comet. To image the Deep Impact-generated crater requires comet Tempel 1 to put its best face forward during time of closest approach. Conversely, if the imagery from the flyby reveals a different face of Tempel 1 -- the side that does not include the crater generated during the Deep Impact mission -- scientists will be able to further extend the geologic mapping of the comet's nucleus and obtain a better understanding of the formation and structure of comet nuclei surface features.
Journey with Star Dust Mission - Comets Wild 2 (2006) & Tempel 1 (2011) - Importance Our Campaign
Mystery of Comets : Comets remain one of the most elusive bodies within our Solar System. Though scientists have speculated about their evolution and composition, there has been little conclusive data to definitively suggest or support any particular theories. Recently, scientists have begun to aggressively investigate comets, resulting in several NASA missions aimed at collecting data from various comets orbiting within our Solar System. By continuing the investigation of comets and other small bodies, we can explore the mystery of life and the wonders of the universe.
Deep Impact Mission :
Deep Impact is a NASA space probe launched on January 12, 2005. It was designed to study the composition of the comet interior of 9P/Tempel, by releasing an impactor into the comet. At 5:52 UTC on July 4, 2005, the impactor successfully collided with the comet's nucleus. The impact excavated debris from the interior of the nucleus, allowing photographs of the impact crater. The photographs showed the comet to be more dusty and less icy than had been expected. The impact generated a large and bright dust cloud, which unexpectedly obscured the view of the impact crater.
Previous space missions to comets, such as Giotto and Stardust, were fly-by missions. These missions were only able to photograph and examine the surfaces of cometary nuclei from a distance. The Deep Impact mission was the first to eject material from a comet's surface, and the mission garnered large publicity from the media, international scientists, and amateur astronomers.
Upon the completion of its primary mission, proposals were made to further utilize the spacecraft. Consequently, Deep Impact flew by Earth on December 31, 2007 on its way to an extended mission, designated EPOXI, with a dual purpose to study extrasolar planets and comet Hartley 2.
STARDUST MISSION:
Stardust is a 300-kilogram robotic space probe launched by NASA on February 7, 1999 to study the asteroid 5535 Annefrank and collect samples from the coma of comet Wild 2. The primary mission was completed January 15, 2006, when the sample return capsule returned to earth.
Operating for 12 years and 8 days, Stardust is currently on an extended mission to intercept and study asteroid Tempel 1 on February 15, 2011. Tempel 1 was previously visited by Deep Impact on July 4, 2005. It is the first sample return mission to collect cosmic dust and return the sample to Earth.
Comet Tempel 1:
Tempel 1 (official designation: 9P/Tempel), is a periodic comet discovered by Wilhelm Tempel in 1867. It currently completes an orbit of the Sun every 5.5 years. Tempel 1 was the target of the Deep Impact space mission, which photographed a deliberate high-speed impact upon the comet. It was re-visited by the Stardust spacecraft on February 15, 2011.
Comet Wild 2 :
Comet 81P/Wild, also known as Wild 2, is a comet named after Swiss astronomer Paul Wild, who discovered it in 1978 using a 40-cm Schmidt telescope at Zimmerwald.
For most of its 4.5 billion-year lifetime, Wild 2 probably had a more distant and circular orbit. In September 1974, it passed within less than one million kilometers of the planet Jupiter, whose strong gravitational pull perturbed the comet's orbit and brought it into the inner Solar System.Its orbital period changed from 43 years to about 6 years, and its perihelion is now about 1.59 AU (astronomical unit).
Deep Impact Mission :
Deep Impact is a NASA space probe launched on January 12, 2005. It was designed to study the composition of the comet interior of 9P/Tempel, by releasing an impactor into the comet. At 5:52 UTC on July 4, 2005, the impactor successfully collided with the comet's nucleus. The impact excavated debris from the interior of the nucleus, allowing photographs of the impact crater. The photographs showed the comet to be more dusty and less icy than had been expected. The impact generated a large and bright dust cloud, which unexpectedly obscured the view of the impact crater.
Previous space missions to comets, such as Giotto and Stardust, were fly-by missions. These missions were only able to photograph and examine the surfaces of cometary nuclei from a distance. The Deep Impact mission was the first to eject material from a comet's surface, and the mission garnered large publicity from the media, international scientists, and amateur astronomers.
Upon the completion of its primary mission, proposals were made to further utilize the spacecraft. Consequently, Deep Impact flew by Earth on December 31, 2007 on its way to an extended mission, designated EPOXI, with a dual purpose to study extrasolar planets and comet Hartley 2.
STARDUST MISSION:
Stardust is a 300-kilogram robotic space probe launched by NASA on February 7, 1999 to study the asteroid 5535 Annefrank and collect samples from the coma of comet Wild 2. The primary mission was completed January 15, 2006, when the sample return capsule returned to earth.
Operating for 12 years and 8 days, Stardust is currently on an extended mission to intercept and study asteroid Tempel 1 on February 15, 2011. Tempel 1 was previously visited by Deep Impact on July 4, 2005. It is the first sample return mission to collect cosmic dust and return the sample to Earth.
Comet Tempel 1:
Tempel 1 (official designation: 9P/Tempel), is a periodic comet discovered by Wilhelm Tempel in 1867. It currently completes an orbit of the Sun every 5.5 years. Tempel 1 was the target of the Deep Impact space mission, which photographed a deliberate high-speed impact upon the comet. It was re-visited by the Stardust spacecraft on February 15, 2011.
Comet Wild 2 :
Comet 81P/Wild, also known as Wild 2, is a comet named after Swiss astronomer Paul Wild, who discovered it in 1978 using a 40-cm Schmidt telescope at Zimmerwald.
For most of its 4.5 billion-year lifetime, Wild 2 probably had a more distant and circular orbit. In September 1974, it passed within less than one million kilometers of the planet Jupiter, whose strong gravitational pull perturbed the comet's orbit and brought it into the inner Solar System.Its orbital period changed from 43 years to about 6 years, and its perihelion is now about 1.59 AU (astronomical unit).
Comets - Key to Understand Ourselves - Comet Missions
Mystery of Comets : Comets remain one of the most elusive bodies within our Solar System. Though scientists have speculated about their evolution and composition, there has been little conclusive data to definitively suggest or support any particular theories. Recently, scientists have begun to aggressively investigate comets, resulting in several NASA missions aimed at collecting data from various comets orbiting within our Solar System. By continuing the investigation of comets and other small bodies, we can explore the mystery of life and the wonders of the universe.
An Overview :
Though frequently beautiful, comets historically have stricken terror as often as they have generated wonder as they arc across the sky during their passages around the sun. Astrologers interpreted the sudden appearances of the glowing visitors as ill omens presaging famine, flood or the death of kings. Even as recently as the 1910 appearance of Halley's Comet, entrepreneurs did a brisk business selling gas masks to people who feared Earth's passage through the comet's tail. In the 4th century B.C., the Greek philosopher Aristotle concluded that comets were some kind of emission from Earth that rose into the sky. The heavens, he maintained, were perfect and orderly; a phenomenon as unexpected and erratic as a comet surely could not be part of the celestial vault. In 1577, Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe carefully examined the positions of a comet and the moon against the star background using observations of the comet made at the same time from two different locations, Tycho noted that both observers saw the comet nearly in the same location with respect to the background stars. If the comet was closer than the moon, this would not have been the case. This so-called parallax effect can be demonstrated if you hold up a finger and look at it while closing one eye and then the other. Tycho concluded that the comet was at least six times farther away than the moon. A hundred years later, the English physicist Isaac Newton established that a comet appearing in 1680 followed a nearly parabolic orbit. The English astronomer Edmond Halley used Newton's method to study the orbits of two dozen documented cometary visits. The orbits of three comets seen in 1531, 1607 and 1682 were so similar that he concluded they in fact were appearances of a single comet wheeling around the sun in a closed ellipse every 75 years or so. He successfully predicted the next visit in 1758-9, and the comet thereafter bore his name. Since then, astronomers have concluded that some comets return relatively frequently, in intervals ranging from 3 to 200 years; these are called "short-period" comets. Others have enormous orbits that bring them back only once in hundreds of millennia. In the mid-1800s, scientists also began to turn their attention to the question of comets' composition. Astronomers noted that several major meteor showers took place when Earth passed through the known orbits of comets, leading them to conclude that the objects are clumps of dust or sand. By the early 20th century, astronomers studied comets using the technique of spectroscopy, breaking down the color spectrum of light given off by an object to reveal the chemical makeup of the object. They concluded that comets also emitted gases and molecular ions in addition to the grains of dust. In 1950, the American astronomer Fred L. Whipple (1906-2004) authored a major paper proposing what became known as the "dirty snowball" model of the cometary nucleus. This model pictures the nucleus as a mixture of dark organic material, rocky grains and water ice. ("Organic" means that the compound is based on carbon and hydrogen, but is not necessarily biological in origin.) Most nuclei of comets range in size from about 1 to 10 kilometers (1/2 to 6 miles) in diameter.
If comets contain icy material, they must originate and reside somewhere much colder than the relatively warm inner solar system. In 1950, the Dutch astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort (1900-1992) used indirect reasoning from observations to predict the existence of a vast cloud of comets orbiting many billions of miles from the sun -- perhaps 50,000 astronomical units (AU) away (one AU is the distance from Earth to the sun), or nearly halfway to the next nearest star. This region has since become known as the Oort Cloud. A year later, the Dutch-born American astronomer Gerard Kuiper (1905-1973) pointed out that there should be comet-like objects remaining in the outer planetary region after the solar system formation process was complete. He suggested the existence of a belt of dormant comets lying just outside the orbits of the planets at perhaps 30 to 100 AU from the sun; this has become known as the Kuiper Belt. (Other astronomers such as Frederick Leonard and Kenneth Edgeworth also speculated about the existence of such a belt in the 1930s and 1940s, and so the region is sometimes referred to as the Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt, the Leonard-Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt, and so on.) The Kuiper Belt is now known to be the source of those comets with relatively short orbital periods about the sun. Close encounters with other dormant comets sometimes change their orbits so that they venture in toward the sun and fall under the influence of the gravities of the giant outer planets -- first Neptune, then Uranus, then Saturn and finally Jupiter. The Oort Cloud, by contrast, would be the home of long-period comets. They are periodically nudged from their orbits by any one of several influences -- perhaps the gravitational pull of a passing star or giant molecular cloud, or tidal forces of the Milky Way Galaxy. In addition to the length of time between their visits, another feature distinguishes short- and long-period comets. The orbits of short-period comets are all fairly close to the ecliptic plane, the plane in which Earth and most other planets orbit the sun. Long-period comets, by contrast, dive inwards toward the sun from virtually any part of the sky. This suggests that the Kuiper Belt is a relatively flat belt, whereas the Oort Cloud is a three-dimensional sphere surrounding the solar system. Where did the Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt come from? Most astronomers now believe that the vast majority of material that became comets condensed in the outer solar system around the orbits of Uranus and Neptune and beyond. Gravitational effects from those giant planets flung some of the comets outward to the Oort cloud, while the comets in the Kuiper Belt may have remained there. Residing at the farthest reaches of the sun's influence, comets did not undergo the same heating as the rest of the objects in the solar system, so they retain, largely unchanged, the original composition of solar system materials. As the preserved building blocks of the outer solar system, comets offer clues to the chemical mixture from which the planets formed some 4.6 billion years ago. The geologic record of the planets shows that, about 3.9 billion years ago, a period of heavy cometary and asteroidal bombardment tapered off. The earliest evidence of life on Earth dates somewhere between 3.5 and 3.9 billion years ago, just after the end of this heavy bombardment. The constant barrage of debris had vaporized any water on Earth, leaving the planet too hot for the survival of the fragile carbon-based molecules upon which life is based. Scientists therefore wonder: How could life form so quickly when there was so little liquid water or carbon- based molecules on Earth's surface? The answer may be that comets, which are abundant in both water and carbon-based molecules, delivered essential ingredients for life to begin. Comets are also at least partially responsible for the replenishment of Earth's oceans after the vaporization of an early ocean during the late heavy bombardment. While Earth has long been regarded as the "water planet," it and the other terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus and Mars) are actually poor in the percentage of water ice and in carbon-based molecules they contain when compared to objects that reside in the outer solar system at Jupiter's orbit or beyond. Comets are about 50 percent water by weight and about 10 to 20 percent carbon by weight. It has long been suspected that what little carbon and water there is on Earth was delivered here by objects such as comets that came from a more water-rich part of the solar system. While comets are a likely source for life's building blocks, they have also played a devastating role in altering life on our planet. A comet or asteroid is credited as the likely source of the impact that changed Earth's climate, wiped out the dinosaurs and gave rise to the age of mammals 65 million years ago. Comet dust is not considered to be a threat because it is a natural component of our environment. More than 30,000 tons of comet dust falls to Earth every year. In a single day, the land area of the state of California theoretically collects a billion times as many 10-micron cometary particles as the Stardust mission returned. This flux of outer solar system material has occurred for billions of years and may have even played a role in the evolution of life on our planet by bringing necessary organic compounds to Earth.
Here is the list of Missions to Comets : Current and Past Missions
* New Horizons - NASA Pluto and Kuiper Belt mission
* Deep Impact/EPOXI - NASA Flyby of Comets P/Tempel 1 and Hartley 2 (2005)
* Rosetta - ESA Mission to Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko (2004)
* CONTOUR - NASA Mission to fly by three comet nuclei (2002)
* Genesis - NASA Discovery Solar Wind Sample Return Mission (2001)
* Stardust - NASA Discovery Mission to collect samples from Comet P/Wild 2 (1999)
* Deep Space 1 - NASA Flyby Mission to comet Borrelly and asteroid Braille (1998)
* Galileo - NASA Mission to Jupiter, imaged Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 Impact (1989)
* Giotto - ESA mission to Comets Halley and Grigg-Skjellerup
* ICE (ISEE-3) - NASA Mission to Comet Giacobini-Zinner
* Sakigake - Japanese ISAS mission to Comet Halley
* Suisei - Japanese ISAS mission to Comet Halley
* Vega 1 - Soviet mission to Venus and Comet Halley
* Vega 2 - Soviet mission to Venus and Comet Halley
Future Missions
* Champollion/Deep Space 4 - [Cancelled] NASA Orbiter and Lander to comet Tempel 1 (2003)
An Overview :
Though frequently beautiful, comets historically have stricken terror as often as they have generated wonder as they arc across the sky during their passages around the sun. Astrologers interpreted the sudden appearances of the glowing visitors as ill omens presaging famine, flood or the death of kings. Even as recently as the 1910 appearance of Halley's Comet, entrepreneurs did a brisk business selling gas masks to people who feared Earth's passage through the comet's tail. In the 4th century B.C., the Greek philosopher Aristotle concluded that comets were some kind of emission from Earth that rose into the sky. The heavens, he maintained, were perfect and orderly; a phenomenon as unexpected and erratic as a comet surely could not be part of the celestial vault. In 1577, Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe carefully examined the positions of a comet and the moon against the star background using observations of the comet made at the same time from two different locations, Tycho noted that both observers saw the comet nearly in the same location with respect to the background stars. If the comet was closer than the moon, this would not have been the case. This so-called parallax effect can be demonstrated if you hold up a finger and look at it while closing one eye and then the other. Tycho concluded that the comet was at least six times farther away than the moon. A hundred years later, the English physicist Isaac Newton established that a comet appearing in 1680 followed a nearly parabolic orbit. The English astronomer Edmond Halley used Newton's method to study the orbits of two dozen documented cometary visits. The orbits of three comets seen in 1531, 1607 and 1682 were so similar that he concluded they in fact were appearances of a single comet wheeling around the sun in a closed ellipse every 75 years or so. He successfully predicted the next visit in 1758-9, and the comet thereafter bore his name. Since then, astronomers have concluded that some comets return relatively frequently, in intervals ranging from 3 to 200 years; these are called "short-period" comets. Others have enormous orbits that bring them back only once in hundreds of millennia. In the mid-1800s, scientists also began to turn their attention to the question of comets' composition. Astronomers noted that several major meteor showers took place when Earth passed through the known orbits of comets, leading them to conclude that the objects are clumps of dust or sand. By the early 20th century, astronomers studied comets using the technique of spectroscopy, breaking down the color spectrum of light given off by an object to reveal the chemical makeup of the object. They concluded that comets also emitted gases and molecular ions in addition to the grains of dust. In 1950, the American astronomer Fred L. Whipple (1906-2004) authored a major paper proposing what became known as the "dirty snowball" model of the cometary nucleus. This model pictures the nucleus as a mixture of dark organic material, rocky grains and water ice. ("Organic" means that the compound is based on carbon and hydrogen, but is not necessarily biological in origin.) Most nuclei of comets range in size from about 1 to 10 kilometers (1/2 to 6 miles) in diameter.
If comets contain icy material, they must originate and reside somewhere much colder than the relatively warm inner solar system. In 1950, the Dutch astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort (1900-1992) used indirect reasoning from observations to predict the existence of a vast cloud of comets orbiting many billions of miles from the sun -- perhaps 50,000 astronomical units (AU) away (one AU is the distance from Earth to the sun), or nearly halfway to the next nearest star. This region has since become known as the Oort Cloud. A year later, the Dutch-born American astronomer Gerard Kuiper (1905-1973) pointed out that there should be comet-like objects remaining in the outer planetary region after the solar system formation process was complete. He suggested the existence of a belt of dormant comets lying just outside the orbits of the planets at perhaps 30 to 100 AU from the sun; this has become known as the Kuiper Belt. (Other astronomers such as Frederick Leonard and Kenneth Edgeworth also speculated about the existence of such a belt in the 1930s and 1940s, and so the region is sometimes referred to as the Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt, the Leonard-Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt, and so on.) The Kuiper Belt is now known to be the source of those comets with relatively short orbital periods about the sun. Close encounters with other dormant comets sometimes change their orbits so that they venture in toward the sun and fall under the influence of the gravities of the giant outer planets -- first Neptune, then Uranus, then Saturn and finally Jupiter. The Oort Cloud, by contrast, would be the home of long-period comets. They are periodically nudged from their orbits by any one of several influences -- perhaps the gravitational pull of a passing star or giant molecular cloud, or tidal forces of the Milky Way Galaxy. In addition to the length of time between their visits, another feature distinguishes short- and long-period comets. The orbits of short-period comets are all fairly close to the ecliptic plane, the plane in which Earth and most other planets orbit the sun. Long-period comets, by contrast, dive inwards toward the sun from virtually any part of the sky. This suggests that the Kuiper Belt is a relatively flat belt, whereas the Oort Cloud is a three-dimensional sphere surrounding the solar system. Where did the Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt come from? Most astronomers now believe that the vast majority of material that became comets condensed in the outer solar system around the orbits of Uranus and Neptune and beyond. Gravitational effects from those giant planets flung some of the comets outward to the Oort cloud, while the comets in the Kuiper Belt may have remained there. Residing at the farthest reaches of the sun's influence, comets did not undergo the same heating as the rest of the objects in the solar system, so they retain, largely unchanged, the original composition of solar system materials. As the preserved building blocks of the outer solar system, comets offer clues to the chemical mixture from which the planets formed some 4.6 billion years ago. The geologic record of the planets shows that, about 3.9 billion years ago, a period of heavy cometary and asteroidal bombardment tapered off. The earliest evidence of life on Earth dates somewhere between 3.5 and 3.9 billion years ago, just after the end of this heavy bombardment. The constant barrage of debris had vaporized any water on Earth, leaving the planet too hot for the survival of the fragile carbon-based molecules upon which life is based. Scientists therefore wonder: How could life form so quickly when there was so little liquid water or carbon- based molecules on Earth's surface? The answer may be that comets, which are abundant in both water and carbon-based molecules, delivered essential ingredients for life to begin. Comets are also at least partially responsible for the replenishment of Earth's oceans after the vaporization of an early ocean during the late heavy bombardment. While Earth has long been regarded as the "water planet," it and the other terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus and Mars) are actually poor in the percentage of water ice and in carbon-based molecules they contain when compared to objects that reside in the outer solar system at Jupiter's orbit or beyond. Comets are about 50 percent water by weight and about 10 to 20 percent carbon by weight. It has long been suspected that what little carbon and water there is on Earth was delivered here by objects such as comets that came from a more water-rich part of the solar system. While comets are a likely source for life's building blocks, they have also played a devastating role in altering life on our planet. A comet or asteroid is credited as the likely source of the impact that changed Earth's climate, wiped out the dinosaurs and gave rise to the age of mammals 65 million years ago. Comet dust is not considered to be a threat because it is a natural component of our environment. More than 30,000 tons of comet dust falls to Earth every year. In a single day, the land area of the state of California theoretically collects a billion times as many 10-micron cometary particles as the Stardust mission returned. This flux of outer solar system material has occurred for billions of years and may have even played a role in the evolution of life on our planet by bringing necessary organic compounds to Earth.
Here is the list of Missions to Comets : Current and Past Missions
* New Horizons - NASA Pluto and Kuiper Belt mission
* Deep Impact/EPOXI - NASA Flyby of Comets P/Tempel 1 and Hartley 2 (2005)
* Rosetta - ESA Mission to Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko (2004)
* CONTOUR - NASA Mission to fly by three comet nuclei (2002)
* Genesis - NASA Discovery Solar Wind Sample Return Mission (2001)
* Stardust - NASA Discovery Mission to collect samples from Comet P/Wild 2 (1999)
* Deep Space 1 - NASA Flyby Mission to comet Borrelly and asteroid Braille (1998)
* Galileo - NASA Mission to Jupiter, imaged Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 Impact (1989)
* Giotto - ESA mission to Comets Halley and Grigg-Skjellerup
* ICE (ISEE-3) - NASA Mission to Comet Giacobini-Zinner
* Sakigake - Japanese ISAS mission to Comet Halley
* Suisei - Japanese ISAS mission to Comet Halley
* Vega 1 - Soviet mission to Venus and Comet Halley
* Vega 2 - Soviet mission to Venus and Comet Halley
Future Missions
* Champollion/Deep Space 4 - [Cancelled] NASA Orbiter and Lander to comet Tempel 1 (2003)
Asteroid 2011 CA7 Earth Flyby 9th/10th February 2011
Newly-discovered asteroid 2011 CA7 is flying past Earth today only 63,000 miles away, or 1/4th the distance to the Moon. At closest approach around 1930 UT on Feb. 9th, the VW-Bug-sized space rock will zip through the constellation Orion glowing like a 17th magnitude star.
Here is the Simulation of the Asteroid as it passes by Earth.
Here is the Simulation of the Asteroid as it passes by Earth.
Asteroid 2011 CQ1 Missed Earth - Flyby at 11,855 km
On 4th February a Asteroid 2011 CQ1 pass by earth at 11, 855 Km 5,480 km.
When this article was written at 2.00 a.m. 5th Feb the asteroid was expected to pass by 11, 855 km. But latest information available by authorities say it missed us by 5,480 km only. The size of the object is 1 meter. Not only that many other interesting aspects have come forward as a replicate below:
Asteroid 2011 CQ1 was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey on February 4 and made a record close Earth approach 14 hours later on February 4 at 19:39 UT (14:39 EST). It passed to within 0.85 Earth radii (5480 km) of the Earth's surface over a region in the mid-Pacific.
This object, only about one meter in diameter, is the closest non-impacting object in our asteroid catalog to date. Prior to the Earth close approach, this object was in a so-called Apollo-class orbit that was mostly outside the Earth's orbit. Following the close approach, the Earth's gravitational attraction modified the object's orbit to an Aten-class orbit where the asteroid spends almost all of its time inside the Earth's orbit.
As is evident from the diagram, the close Earth approach changed the asteroid's flight path by about 60 degrees. Because of their small size, object's of this size are difficult to discover but there is likely to be nearly a billion objects of this size and larger in near-Earth space and one would expect one to strike Earth's atmosphere every few weeks on average. Upon striking the atmosphere, small objects of this size create visually impressive fireball events but only rarely do even a few small fragments reach the ground.
Here is the Video of Animation of the Asteroid :
The object, officially designated 2011 CQ1, is about 2-3 meters (6.5 -10 ft) wide, and at closest approach it came within 11,855 km (7,366 miles) or about 0.03 lunar distances (LD), or 0.00008 astronomical units (AU).
When this article was written at 2.00 a.m. 5th Feb the asteroid was expected to pass by 11, 855 km. But latest information available by authorities say it missed us by 5,480 km only. The size of the object is 1 meter. Not only that many other interesting aspects have come forward as a replicate below:
Asteroid 2011 CQ1 was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey on February 4 and made a record close Earth approach 14 hours later on February 4 at 19:39 UT (14:39 EST). It passed to within 0.85 Earth radii (5480 km) of the Earth's surface over a region in the mid-Pacific.
This object, only about one meter in diameter, is the closest non-impacting object in our asteroid catalog to date. Prior to the Earth close approach, this object was in a so-called Apollo-class orbit that was mostly outside the Earth's orbit. Following the close approach, the Earth's gravitational attraction modified the object's orbit to an Aten-class orbit where the asteroid spends almost all of its time inside the Earth's orbit.
As is evident from the diagram, the close Earth approach changed the asteroid's flight path by about 60 degrees. Because of their small size, object's of this size are difficult to discover but there is likely to be nearly a billion objects of this size and larger in near-Earth space and one would expect one to strike Earth's atmosphere every few weeks on average. Upon striking the atmosphere, small objects of this size create visually impressive fireball events but only rarely do even a few small fragments reach the ground.
Here is the Video of Animation of the Asteroid :