Observations and analysis of a curved jet in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Abstract

We analyze the physical properties and dynamical origin of a curved jet of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko that was observed repeatedly in several nucleus rotations starting on May 30 and persisting until early August, 2015. We simulated the motion of dust grains ejected from the nucleus surface under the influence of the gravity and viscous drag effect of the expanding gas flow from the rotating nucleus. The formation of the curved jet is a combination of the size of the dust particles (~0.1-1 mm) and the location of the source region near the nucleus equator. This enhances the spiral feature of the collimated dust stream after the dust is accelerated to a terminal speed on the order of m/s.

arXiv comment5pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Are fractured cliffs the source of cometary dust jets ? Insights from OSIRIS/Rosetta at 67P
• Evolution of the Dust Coma in Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko Before 2009 Perihelion
• Long-Term Monitoring of Comet 103P/Hartley 2

Cited by in corpus (10)

• The Spectral Energy Distributions of Fermi Blazars
• Summer fireworks on comet 67P
• The Rosetta mission orbiter Science overview the comet phase
• The Nature and Frequency of the Gas Outbursts in Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko observed by the Alice Far-ultraviolet Spectrograph on Rosetta
• Comet 29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 1 dust environment from photometric observation at the SOAR Telescope
• Linking surface morphology, composition, and activity on the nucleus of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko
• Sublimation of icy aggregates in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko detected with the OSIRIS cameras onboard Rosetta
• Models of Rosetta/OSIRIS 67P dust coma phase function
• Local manifestations of cometary activity
• Modeling of the outburst on July 29th, 2015 observed with OSIRIS cameras in the southern hemisphere of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko