Credit: NASA, ESA, STScI, Q. Zhang and Z. Levay

The Hubble images of comet NEOWISE, taken on August 8, zero in on the visitor’s coma, the gossamer shell that surrounds its nucleus, and its dusty output. This is the first time a comet of this brightness has been photographed at such resolution after this close of a pass by the Sun – past attempts proved unsuccessful after those comets disintegrated in the searing heat.

“Hubble has far better resolution than we can get with any other telescope of this comet,” said lead researcher Qicheng Zhang of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California. “That resolution is very key in getting an image very close to the nucleus. It lets us see changes in the dust right after it’s stripped from that nucleus due to solar heat, sampling dust as close to the original properties of the comet as possible.”

The heart of the comet, its icy nucleus, is too small to be seen by Hubble. The ball of ice may be no more than 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) across. Instead, the Hubble image captures a portion of the vast cloud of gas and dust enveloping the nucleus, which measures about 6,800 miles (11,000 kilometers) across in this photo.

The Hubble photos may help reveal the color of the comet’s dust and how those colors change as the comet moves away from the sun. This, in turn, may explain how solar heat affects the contents and structure of that dust and the comet’s coma. The ultimate goal here would be to learn the original properties of the dust.

Researchers are currently delving more into the data to see what they’re able to confirm.

NASA’s Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) mission first discovered its namesake comet in March 2020. As the comet made its way closer to the Sun, searing heat melted its ices, unleashing dust and gas that leaves the signature tails. Throughout the summer, ground-based sky watchers in the Northern Hemisphere were able to catch a view of the traveler moving across the sky.

Provider: Space Telescope Science Institute

Image Source: https://hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2020/news-2020-45

Curator: STScI, Baltimore, MD, USA

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