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A comet tail and coma are visible features of a comet when they are illuminated by the Sun and may become visible from Earth when a comet passes through the inner Solar System. As a comet approaches the inner Solar System, solar radiation causes the volatile materials within the comet to vaporize and stream out of the nucleus, carrying dust ...
A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that warms and begins to release gases when passing close to the Sun, a process called outgassing.This produces an extended, gravitationally unbound atmosphere or coma surrounding the nucleus, and sometimes a tail of gas and dust gas blown out from the coma.
As the comet warms, parts of it sublimate; [1] this gives a comet a diffuse appearance when viewed through telescopes and distinguishes it from stars. The word coma comes from the Greek κόμη (kómē), which means "hair" and is the origin of the word comet itself. [2] [3] The coma is generally made of ice and comet dust. [1]
Comet Lulin antitail to the left, ion tail to right Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) as it appeared on October 14th 2024 with a prominent "anti-tail" pointing towards the horizon. Showing how a comet may appear to exhibit a short tail pointing in the opposite direction to its type II or dust tail as viewed from Earth i.e. an antitail
Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks is one of the brightest known co m ets, coming around every 71 years, according to NASA. It earned the nickname of “devil comet” in 2023 when an outburst caused the comet ...
The comet visits our solar system about every 80,000 years, meaning that it has not been seen from Earth since the Neanderthals were around. A3’s bright look and clear visibility in the sky led ...
Comet orbits had been determined quite precisely, yet comets were at times recovered "off-schedule," by as much as days. Early comets could be explained by a "resisting medium"—such as "the aether", or the cumulative action of meteoroids against the front of the comet(s). [citation needed] But comets could return both early and late. Whipple ...
Some comets have been around for thousands of years, including Comet C/2024 G3, which has already made several passes into the solar system. The last time the comet passed in the solar system was ...