THE NATURE OF COMETS





WHAT MAKES UP A COMET?

Sometimes called a "Dirty Snowball", Comets are a mix of frozen water and gases. These particles did not incorporate into planets when the surrounding solar system was forming.

As they near the Sun and become "active" they have several apparent aspects.....

  • THE NUCLEUS; which is relatively solid and stable and composed primarily of ice and gas and small amounts of dust and other solids.
  • THE COMA; a dense cloud of water, carbon dioxide and other neutral gases "sublimed" off the nucleus.
  • THE HYDROGEN CLOUD; millions of miles in diameter, but a very spare envelope of neutral hydrogen.
  • THE DUST TRAIL; up to 10 million miles long and composed of smoke-sized dust particles driven off the nucleus by escaping gases. This is the most prominent part of a comet to the naked eye.
  • THE ION TAIL; up to 100 million miles long and composed of plasma and laced with rays and streamers caused by interactions with the solar winds.

    Comets are invisible to us except when they are near the Sun and most Comets have highly eccentric orbits which take them far beyond the orbit of Pluto where they seem to "disappear" for a millennia. Only short- and intermediate- period comets like Halley's stay within the orbit of Pluto for a significant enough portion of their orbits.

    Meteor showers sometimes occur when the Earth passes thru the orbit of a Comet such as "Perseid" meteor shower every year between Aug. 9 - 13 when the Earth passes thru the orbit of the "Swift-Tuttle" Comet, or the "Orionid" meteor shower in October as we pass thru the orbit of Halley's Comet.

  • WHERE DO THEY COME FROM?

    The current theories hold that there are atleast two pools of comets in this solar system alone. The OORT CLOUD which was first proposed by Jan Oort, a Danish Astronomer, in 1950, and believed to completely encircle the entire solar system and contain approximately one TRILLION (1,000,000,000,000) cometary nuclei all orbiting between 10,000 and 100,000 times the Earth's distance from the Sun. These nuclei stay in the Oort Cloud until something disturbs them like a passing star or gas cloud. This extremely rare event happens about only once every few million years. This "event" then causes some of these "nuclei" to change their orbit and fall toward the inner solar system, a million year long trip from their original homes!

    The second point of origin for comets is believed to be the KUIPER BELT. It is much closer and lies within the solar system and is thought to be very similar to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, only further out. In the 1980's several comets and asteriod type objects have been discovered orbiting the Sun at a distance of 50 to 100 times the Earth's distance to the Sun, which is outside the orbit of Pluto. Scientists now believe that most short-period comets that orbit the Sun in periods of 500 years or less could be from this area.

    However, it is now known that not all short-period comets come from this area. Incoming comets can interact with planets in the solar system, which changes their orbits.

    If a comet orginates in the Oort Cloud they ususally have a "parabolic orbit" (that is they follow the path typical of an object that will only visit the solar system once.) But, if large planets like Jupiter gravitationally interact with them, their orbits can be changed and they can become "caputured" by the Sun into an "elliptical orbit", returning every couple of decades or centuries to the inner solar system. Occasionally, a comet that passes too close to one of these large planets can be ripped appart, or as with the SHOEMAKER-LEVY 9 Comet/s smash into the planet itself!

    All Comets have a beautiful double tail of blue (electrically charged particles) and white (dust particles).

    MORE TO COME ON THE ORGANIC NATURE AND PROPERTIES OF THESE AMAZING GIANTS!!!


    Scientific Reference Information for this page was obtained from the following sites, which I highly recommend; http://gumby.spa.umn.edu/juan/halebopp/orgins/orgins.html....and.....
    http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/comets.html.........
    http://www.phillynews.com/packages/halebopp/find27.html.......
    www.amsci.org/amsci/articles/95articles/CdeDuve.html....
    http://www.phillynews.com/packages/halebopp/come30.htm....



    Click below to go to
    CHEMICAL COMPOUNDS OF LIFE IN COMETS



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    IMPRESSIONS OF HALE-BOPP COMET



    Click below to go to
    BEAUTIFUL PSYCHIC EXPERIENCE WITH JUPITER COMETS IN 1994




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