POSSIBLE DETECTION OF A SHORT TAIL BEHIND COMET 17/P HOLMES Universite de Montreal October 29, 2007
Montreal - The recent brightening of comet Holmes has spurred a frenzy of observations both by amateurs and professionals astronomers alike. All these observations reveal a tailless round yellowish fuzzball in the constellation Perseus. Near infrared images of comet P/17 Holmes, obtained with the 1.6m Ritchey-Chretien telescope at Mont Megantic Observatory (Qc, Canada), indicate a small tail-like feature next to the comet's head. The images were obtained by graduate student Sandie Bouchard and night assistant Bernard Malenfant on the morning of October 26, using SIMON, a Near Infrared Polarimetric Imager. A preliminary analysis, performed by astronomers Pierre Bastien and Rene Doyon from Universite de Montréal and the Centre de Recherche en Astrophysique du Quebec (CRAQ) clearly shows a bright elongated feature surrounding the more luminous comet's coma. This elongated feature, probably a cloud of dust and gas, which resembles a small tail, is going out at position angle of 145 degrees (+/- 5 deg), measured from north and going east. This direction makes an angle of about 33 degrees relative to the Sun-comet direction. Although the images display tantalizing evidence of a tail, the direction of the feature does not point directly in the direction opposite to the Sun, as expected. For more information, contact: Dr. Pierre Bastien Universite de Montreal Tel: 1-514-343-5816 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Image caption: The following raw images were taken with the NIR instrument SIMON. On both images East is up and North is right. Fig.1 : image taken with an I filter Oct 26 at 04:37 EDT (08:37 UT) Fig.2 : same as fig.1 but with a J filter taken at 04:10 EDT (08:10 UT). http://www.astro.umontreal.ca/~casca/PR/holmes_I.png http://www.astro.umontreal.ca/~casca/PR/holmes_J.png PIO Source: Robert Lamontagne Attache de presse/Press Officer Societe canadienne d'astronomie/Canadian Astronomical Society (CASCA) Dept. de Physique Tel: 1-514-343-6111 (p.3195) Universite de Montréal Telecopieur: 1-514-343-2071 C.P. 6128, Succ. Centre-ville Montreal, Que. H3C 3J7 Courriel: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list [email protected] http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
