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Comets

Comets. 2 November 2012. Introduction. The history of comet watching dates back to 1000 BC from the Chinese records and Chaldea, a place in present Iraq. Comets have been regarded as omen, even as recently as 1986. Battle of Hastings - 1066

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Comets

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  1. Comets 2 November 2012

  2. Introduction • The history of comet watching dates back to 1000 BC from the Chinese records and Chaldea, a place in present Iraq. • Comets have been regarded as omen, even as recently as 1986. • Battle of Hastings - 1066 • Today Astronomers study Comets from scientific perspectives, and our understanding of these fascinating objects have grown tremendously.

  3. Dirty Snowballs • Comets are dusty chunk of ice • During each orbit around the sun they partially vaporize • Have elliptical Orbits Courtesy: Calvin J. Hamilton

  4. Orbits of Comets • Elliptical in Shape • Randomly oriented Aphelion distance Comet Sun Earth Perihelion distance

  5. Comet Hunters • Comet are named by International Astronomical Union (IAU) after the person who first discovers them. • Many comets are discovered by amateur astronomers. • Charles Messier, E. E. Bernard, Shoemaker and Levy, Hale and Bopp, Ikeya, Seki and Hayakutake are popular comet hunters.

  6. Origins of Comets • Comets are thought to be the left over debris from during the time of formation of the solar system. • The elliptical orbits of comets suggest that they underwent gravitational pull from the giant planets. • This all lead us to infer two possible locations where comets could start their journey towards the sun.

  7. Comets Tails • Ludwig Biermann propose the idea of solar wind to explain comet tails. Mariner 2 spacecraft captured the one such event in 1962.

  8. Comet Collisions Courtesy: NASA/JPL

  9. Kohoutek

  10. Comet West

  11. Shoemaker-Levy 9

  12. Shoemaker-Levy hits Jupiter

  13. Hale-Bopp Ion tail & Dust tsil

  14. Halley from Giotto

  15. Hyakutake

  16. Deep Impact Tempel 1

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