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Community => Recreation Commons => Our researchers have made a breakthrough! => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on November 28, 2013, 10:34:06 pm

Title: Scientists: Sun-grazing comet likely broke up
Post by: Buster's Uncle on November 28, 2013, 10:34:06 pm

Scientists: Sun-grazing comet likely broke up
Associated Press
By KARL RITTER 54 minutes ago


(http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/OGIQHHb.6UFlhANGtu6tSQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTY1MDtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NjA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/0a91810df8285527440f6a7067002ed9.jpg)
In this frame grab taken from enhanced video made by NASA's STEREO-A spacecraft, comet ISON, left, approaches the sun on Nov. 25, 2013. Comet Encke is shown just below ISON, The sun is to the right, just outside the frame. ISON, which was discovered a year ago, is making its first spin around the sun and will come the closest to the super-hot solar surface on Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, Nov. 28, 2013, at 1:37 p.m. EST. (AP Photo/NASA)



STOCKHOLM (AP) — Once billed as the comet of the century, Comet ISON apparently was no match for the sun.

Images from NASA spacecraft showed the comet approaching for a slingshot around the sun on Thursday, but nothing coming out on the other side.

"It does seem like Comet ISON probably hasn't survived this journey," U.S. Navy solar researcher Karl Battams said in a Google+ hangout.

Phil Plait, an astronomer who runs the "Bad Astronomy" blog, agreed, saying "I don't think the comet made it."

Still, he said, it wouldn't be all bad news if the 4.5-billion-year-old space rock broke up into pieces, because astronomers might be able to study them and learn more about comets.

"This is a time capsule looking back at the birth of the solar system," he said.

The comet was two-thirds of a mile wide as it got within 1 million miles (1.6 million kilometers) of the sun, which in space terms basically means grazing it.

NASA solar physicist Alex Young said it would take a few hours to confirm ISON's demise, but admitted things were not looking good.

He said the comet had been expected to show up in images from the Solar Dynamics Observatory spacecraft at around noon eastern time (1700 GMT), but almost four hours later there was "no sign of it whatsoever."

"Maybe over the last couple of days it's been breaking up," Young told The Associated Press. "The nucleus could have been gone a day or so ago."

Comet ISON was first spotted by a Russian telescope in September last year.

Some sky gazers speculated early on that it might become the comet of the century because of its brightness, although expectations dimmed as it got closer to the sun.

Made up of loosely packed ice and dirt, it was essentially a dirty snowball from the Oort cloud, an area of comets and debris on the fringes of the solar system.

Two years ago, a smaller comet, Lovejoy, grazed the sun and survived, but fell apart a couple of days later.

"That's why we expected that maybe this one would make it because it was 10 times the size," Young said.

It may be a while before there's a sun-grazer of the same size, he said.

"They are pretty rare," Young said. "So we might not see one maybe even in our lifetime."


http://news.yahoo.com/scientists-sun-grazing-comet-likely-broke-202622735.html (http://news.yahoo.com/scientists-sun-grazing-comet-likely-broke-202622735.html)

Title: No sign of comet after pass around sun: scientists
Post by: Buster's Uncle on November 28, 2013, 11:07:53 pm

No sign of comet after pass around sun: scientists
Reuters
By Irene Klotz 2 hours ago


(http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/aLJYHjK6XtUW_OaWMtDWtw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTIxODtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz00NTA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/Reuters/2013-11-27T183322Z_1_CBRE9AQ1FJO00_RTROPTP_2_SPACE-COMET.JPG)
Comet ISON is pictured in this November 19, 2013 handout photo by NASA, taken using a 14-inch telescope



(Reuters) - A comet's 5.5-million-year journey to the inner solar system apparently ended during a suicidal trip around the sun, leaving no trace of its once-bright tail or even remnants of rock and dust, scientists said on Thursday.

The comet, known as ISON, was discovered last year when it was still far beyond Jupiter, raising the prospect of a spectacular naked-eye object by the time it graced Earth's skies in December.

Comet ISON passed just 730,000 miles (1.2 million km) from the surface of the sun at 1:37 p.m. EST/1837 GMT on Thursday. Astronomers used a fleet of solar telescopes to look for the comet after its slingshot around the sun, but to no avail.

"I'm not seeing anything that emerged from the behind the solar disk. That could be the nail in the coffin," astrophysicist Karl Battams, with the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, said during a live broadcast on NASA TV."

"It's sad that it seemed to have ended this way, but we're going to learn more about this comet," he added.

At closest approach, the comet was moving faster than 217 miles per second(350 km per second) through the sun's atmosphere.

At that distance, it reached temperatures of 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit(2,760 degrees Celsius) - hot enough to vaporize not just ices in the comet's body, but dust and rock as well.

If the comet or any large fragments survived the close encounter with the sun, they would be visible to the naked eye in Earth's skies in a week or two.

The comet was discovered last year by two amateur astronomers using Russia's International Scientific Optical Network, or ISON.

Comets are believed to be frozen remains left over from the formation of the solar system some 4.5 billion years ago.

The family of comets that ISON belongs to resides in the Oort Cloud, located about 10,000 times farther away from the sun than Earth, halfway to the next star.

Occasionally, an Oort Cloud comet is gravitationally nudged out of the cloud by a passing star and into a flight path that millions of years later brings it into the inner solar system. Computer models show ISON was a first-time visitor.

"I hope we see another one soon," said Dean Pesnell, project scientist for NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.


http://news.yahoo.com/no-sign-comet-pass-around-sun-scientists-203418044.html (http://news.yahoo.com/no-sign-comet-pass-around-sun-scientists-203418044.html)

Title: Re: Scientists: Sun-grazing comet likely broke up
Post by: ariete on November 29, 2013, 11:52:27 am

 :(