Search Publications
The surface distributions of the production of the major volatile species, H2O, CO2, CO and O2, from the nucleus of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko throughout the Rosetta Mission as measured by the ROSINA double focusing mass spectrometer
Hansen, Kenneth C.; Altwegg, Kathrin; Rubin, Martin +12 more
The Rosetta Orbiter Spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analysis (ROSINA) suite of instruments operated throughout the over two years of the Rosetta mission operations in the vicinity of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It measured gas densities and composition throughout the comet's atmosphere, or coma. Here we present two-years' worth of measuremen…
Cometary avalanches as the cause of their violent outbursts - a new model of the phenomenon
Wesołowski, M.; Gronkowski, P.; Tralle, I.
The cometary outbursts are one of the most spectacular phenomena one can observe in the sky. They are associated with a sharp increase in the brightness of comets, which arises as a result of the ejection into space the dust, gas or even the fragments of outer layer of these celestial bodies core. Despite the existence of extensive observational m…
Influence of landslides on the erosion of slopes on comet 9P/Tempel 1: Laboratory experiments and numerical simulations
Czechowski, Leszek; Kossacki, Konrad J.; Skóra, Grzegorz
Observations of Comet 9P/Tempel 1 indicate that the boundary of the thick, fluid-like deposit had retreated by up to 50 m during one orbital period (Veverka et al., 2013; Thomas et al., 2013). According to Kossaki (2015), sublimation of buried ice may be responsible for the observed effect, but only if the dust has very high thermal conductivity. …
Limitations in the determination of surface emission distributions on comets through modelling of observational data - A case study based on Rosetta observations
Thomas, Nicolas; Marschall, Raphael; Wu, Jong-Shinn +1 more
The European Space Agency's (ESA) Rosetta mission has returned a vast data set of measurements of the inner gas coma of comet 67/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. These measurements have been used by different groups to determine the distribution of the gas sources at the nucleus surface. The solutions that have been found differ from each other substantiall…
Dayside-to-nightside dust coma brightness asymmetry and its implications for nightside activity at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko
Thomas, N.; Marschall, R.; Wu, J. -S. +2 more
We have determined the dust coma brightness ratio between the dayside and the nightside (DS:NS) in OSIRIS images of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and compared them to results from numerical dust coma simulations to learn more about the dynamic processes that are involved in coma formation. The primary focus of this paper lies in the analysis of …
Plasma distribution around Comet 67P in the last month of the Rosetta mission
Szego, K.; Henri, P.; Nemeth, Z. +3 more
After accompanying comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on its journey around the Sun and observing the evolution of its induced magnetosphere throughout the comet's life-cycle, the Rosetta operations concluded at the end of September 2016 with a controlled impact on the cometary nucleus. At that time, the comet was located more than 3.7 AU from the Su…
Identifying primitive noble gas components in lunar ferroan anorthosites
Gilmour, J. D.; Joy, K. H.; Pernet-Fisher, J. F.
Lunar ferroan anorthosites are the ideal samples for investigating primitive volatile systematics. Not only are these lithologies thought to be direct crystallization products of the Lunar Magma Ocean (LMO), but many samples display short (T38 < 5 Myr) cosmic ray exposure (CRE) ages, minimizing the effects of cosmic ray spallation re…
A photochemical model of ultraviolet atomic line emissions in the inner coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko
Bhardwaj, Anil; Raghuram, Susarla
Alice ultraviolet spectrometer onboard Rosetta space mission observed several spectroscopic emissions emanated from volatile species of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (hearafter 67P/C-G) during its entire escorting phase. The measured emission intensities, when the comet was at around 3 AU pre-perihelion, have been used to derive electron densiti…