Carbon levels in comet Atlas could help in detecting age of other comets: Astronauts

A team of astromers from Russia, South Korea and USA have suggested that amount of carbon in a comet can identify time it has spent in solar system. As per a report in a science news website, if a comet has lower levels of carbon, it indicates that it has been in close proximity to Sun for a longer period of time.

Examining comet Atlas that approached Earth in May 2020 and disintegrated while bursting carbonaceous particles helped astronauts in determining of or comets.

Russian astrophysicists Ekaterina Chornaya and Anton Kochergin joined an international team of researchers to study composition of dust particles in shell and tail of Comet Atlas. study revealed that carbon levels inside comet were very high. Ekaterina Chornaya said that Atlas was expected to be brightest comet of 2020 that would be visible from Earth but inste of observing comet, everyone witnessed its disintegration.

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High carbon levels in Comet Atlas

With help of photometric and polarimetric studies that began before disintegration process, astronauts were able to compare composition of coma (comet shell and tail) before and after it fragmented. During process, y ticed a dramatic growth of positive polarisation branch, along with a large number of carbonaceous particles.

Ekaterina said that Atlas was a comet that enters Solar System only once in 5,476 years. y occasionally approach Sun and are rarely subject to heating.

Researchers are interested in learning about se comets as y contain a lot of preserved primordial matter that can evaporate under influence of solar riation, paving way for more studies. Chornaya, polarimetric response of particles from Comet Atlas matches with that Comet Hale-Bopp - one of brightest comets in history of Earth.

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(Im credits: Twitter/NASA)