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Solar Satellite Spots Otherwise Invisible Comet
By SPACE.com Staff
posted: 02:08 pm ET
08 January 2002
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soho_comet_020108Sometimes the wrong tool can do a job right: This was demonstrated today by a Sun-spying satellite capturing the best images yet of a comet. Comet Machholz 1 remained undiscovered until 1986 because it dances in an elliptic too close to the blinding light of our Sun. Very little is known about the burning rock. Fortunately, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory satellite, SOHO for short, is equipped with a sun-blocking device called a coronagraph. The coronagraph is able to see otherwise invisible outbursts from the Sun, such as coronal mass ejections and solar flares. The coronagraph is basically a blinder that blocks the glare of the Sun's surface. As a result, a very large volume of surrounding space became open to discovery since the craft's first observations in 1996.The coronagraph has enabled the most prolific discovery of comets in the history of astronomy. Most of SOHO's discoveries have been small Sun-grazing comets that quickly boil away in the Sun's roiling atmosphere. But for reasons astronomers are still unsure of, Comet Machholz 1 has survived in its five-year and three-month orbit. The comet has other mysteries to be solved as well. Machholz 1 appears to change in its intensity from year to year. Seen today with an impressive tail, Machholz 1 sometimes is much less vivid, even in its closest approach to the searing star. Astronomers are even unsure of the size of its icy core. "Experts will look closely at these images, and at other images from our ultraviolet coronagraph as well," says Paal Brekke, ESA's deputy project scientist for SOHO. " Maybe we'll find out why Machholz 1 is idiosyncratic." Headline: More Information: Astronomy News by TopicThis Week in Science & Astronomy: News Briefs
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