UCF: Comet Gateway Discovered to Inner Solar System

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UCF: Comet Gateway Discovered to Inner Solar System

Post by bystander » Fri Sep 20, 2019 7:24 pm

Comet Gateway Discovered to Inner Solar System,
May Alter Fundamental Understanding of Comet Evolution

University of Central Florida, Orlando | 2019 Sep 19
A new study led by a University of Central Florida researcher may fundamentally alter our understanding of how comets arrive from the outskirts of the solar system and are funneled to the inner solar system coming closer to Earth.

In a study ... scientist Gal Sarid and co-authors describe the discovery of an orbital “gateway” through which many comets pass before they approach our sun. The gateway was uncovered as part of a simulation of centaurs, small icy bodies traveling on chaotic orbits between Jupiter and Neptune. The study team modeled the evolution of bodies from beyond Neptune’s orbit, through the giant planet’s region, and inside Jupiter’s orbit. These icy bodies are considered nearly pristine remnants of material from the birth of our solar system.

For a long time, the pathway of comets from their original formation location inward toward the sun has been debated.

“How do new comets, controlled by Jupiter’s influence, replace those that are lost? Where is the transition between residing in the outer solar system, as small dormant bodies, and becoming active inner solar system bodies, exhibiting a widespread gas and dust coma and tail?” asks Sarid, the lead scientist for the study. These questions remained a mystery until now. “What we discovered, the gateway model as a ‘cradle of comets,’ will change the way we think about the history of icy bodies,” he says. ...

29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 1, A Centaur in the Gateway to the Jupiter-Family Comets ~ Gal Sarid et al
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