Hubble snaps close-up of celebrity comet NEOWISE

Date:
August 21, 2020
Source:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
Summary:
The Hubble Space Telescope has snapped the closest images yet
of the sky's latest visitor to make headlines, comet NEOWISE,
after it passed by the Sun. This is the first time Hubble has
photographed a comet of this brightness at such resolution after
this close of a pass by the Sun.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== [This image of comet | Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Pagan (STScI), and Q. Zhang (Caltech)] This image of comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope on Aug. 8, 2020. Hubble's image represents the first
time a comet of this brightness has been photographed at such resolution
after this close of a pass by the Sun. The two structures appearing on
the left and right sides of the comet's center are jets made up of ice sublimating from beneath the surface of the nucleus, with the resulting
dust and gas being squeezed through at a high velocity. The jets emerge
as cone-like structures, then are fanned out by the rotation of comet
NEOWISE's nucleus.

Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Pagan (STScI), and Q. Zhang (Caltech) [This image
of comet | Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Pagan (STScI), and Q. Zhang (Caltech)]
This image of comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) was taken by the Hubble Space
Telescope on Aug. 8, 2020. Hubble's image represents the first time
a comet of this brightness has been photographed at such resolution
after this close of a pass by the Sun. The two structures appearing on
the left and right sides of the comet's center are jets made up of ice sublimating from beneath the surface of the nucleus, with the resulting
dust and gas being squeezed through at a high velocity. The jets emerge
as cone-like structures, then are fanned out by the rotation of comet
NEOWISE's nucleus.

Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Pagan (STScI), and Q. Zhang (Caltech) Close NASA
Hubble Space Telescope images of comet NEOWISE, taken on Aug. 8, zero in
on the visitor's coma, the gossamer shell of gas and dust that surrounds
its nucleus as it is heated by the Sun. This is the first time Hubble
has photographed a comet of this brightness at such resolution after
this close of a pass by the Sun.


==========================================================================
The comet photos were taken after NEOWISE skimmed closest to the
Sun on July 3, 2020, at a distance of 27 million miles (43 million
kilometers). Other comets often break apart due to thermal and
gravitational stresses at such close encounters, but Hubble's view shows
that apparently NEOWISE's solid nucleus stayed intact.

"Hubble has far better resolution than we can get with any other
telescope of this comet," said lead researcher Qicheng Zhang of Caltech
in Pasadena, California. "That resolution is very key for seeing details
very close to the nucleus. It lets us see changes in the dust right
after it's stripped from that nucleus due to solar heat, sampling
dust as close to the original properties of the comet as possible."
The heart of the comet, its icy nucleus, is too small to be seen by
Hubble. The ball of ice may be no more than 3 miles (4.8 kilometers)
across. Instead, the Hubble image captures a portion of the vast cloud
of gas and dust enveloping the nucleus, which measures about 11,000 miles (18,000 kilometers) across in this photo. Hubble resolves a pair of jets
from the nucleus shooting out in opposite directions. They emerge from
the nucleus as cones of dust and gas, and then are curved into broader
fan-like structures by the rotation of the nucleus. Jets are the result
of ice sublimating beneath the surface with the resulting dust/gas being squeezed out at high velocity.

The Hubble photos may help reveal the color of the comet's dust and how
those colors change as the comet moves away from the Sun. This, in turn,
may explain how solar heat affects the composition and structure of that
dust in the comet's coma. The ultimate goal here would be to learn the
original properties of the dust to learn more about the conditions of
the early solar system in which it formed.

Comet NEOWISE is considered the brightest comet visible from the Northern Hemisphere since 1997's Hale-Bopp. It's headed beyond the outer solar
system, now traveling at a whopping 144,000 miles per hour. It will not
return to the Sun for another nearly 7,000 years.

Researchers are currently delving more into the data to see what they're
able to confirm.

NASA's Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE)
mission first discovered its namesake comet in March 2020. As the comet
made its way closer to the Sun, searing heat melted its ices, unleashing
dust and gas that leaves the signature tails. Throughout the summer, ground-based sky watchers in the Northern Hemisphere were able to catch
a view of the traveler moving across the sky.

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation
between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA's Goddard Space
Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities
for Research in Astronomy in Washington, D.C.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by
NASA/Goddard_Space_Flight_Center. Note: Content may be edited for style
and length.


========================================================================== Related Multimedia:
* Images_and_animation_of_comet_NEOWISE ==========================================================================


Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/08/200821134124.htm

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