46P/Wirtanen

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46P/Wirtanen
Taken by Jorma Ryske on January 11, 2019 @ Finland, Helsinki

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46P/Wirtanen photographed with UV 387nm narrowband filter showing CN Cyanogen radical gas jets rotating and forming a pinwheel shape around comet's nucleus. Field of view is 20'. During 11 hours of observing time at night 11/12.1.2019 the nucleus of Wirtanen was rotating about one fully round. Animation consists of 10 frames each one hour stack of 5 minute 387nm filter exposures and then CometCIEF processed. Exposures started at 2019-01-11_1610 UTC and end at 2019-01-12_0310 UTC. Telescope was 12" Boren-Simon Newton telescope and CCD QSI690. Jorma Ryske, Finland, Helsinki. CometCIEF Facility: Samarasinha, N. H., Martin, M. P., Larson, S. M, 2013. Cometary Coma Image Enhancement Facility, http://www.psi.edu/research/cometimen.

Photographer's website:

http://https://www.taivaanvahti.fi/observations/show/80336

Comments

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This is an amazing animation!
Have you applied a Larson-Sekanina filter as part of the processing?

/*Peter R

Posted by Peter R 2019-01-20 03:27:00

Thanks Peter. I used CometCIEF filtering algorithm which is enhanced from Larson-Sekanina filtering, CometCIEF produce much less artifacts. Gas jets spiralling around nucleus in this animation are practically pure CN cyanogen radical gas of which origin is sublimated from the Wirtanens icy surface HCN molecules by solar heat radiation and then photodissociate by solar UV radiation emitting at 387nm UV wavelength. Comet and astrochemist scientists knows this reaction surely better, but something like this is behind the cometary activity physical process seen in this animation.

Posted by JormaRyske 2019-01-20 07:42:33

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