What Will Comet ISON Debris Teach Us About the Sun?
Abstract
Comet ISON is a large sun-grazing comet due to pass perihelion on November 28, 2013. It will go through the corona 2.7 Rsun above the surface, much higher than earlier EUV comets. We will use our time-dependent models of cometary debris to discuss how the trail of Comet ISON can be used to probe the solar corona. The debris trail left behind as a sun-grazing comet passes by the Sun undergoes different chemical processes at different distances from the Sun. Near the Sun the material is rapidly converted to atomic ions and becomes part of the solar corona. Far from the Sun the evaporated material can remain in molecular form for a long time, while the grains of asteroidal material can exist long enough to become meteors in planetary atmospheres. The larger fragments may survive as independent comets, until the next perihelion passage. In between those limits the material moves in the solar wind acceleration region. The debris could become entrained in the solar wind and be measured by satellites far from the Sun. This material would be observed as abundance anomalies in the solar wind. We will describe the fate of the cometary debris trail left by Comet ISON and what the trail can tell us about the solar corona and solar wind.
- Publication:
-
AAS/Solar Physics Division Abstracts #44
- Pub Date:
- July 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013SPD....44...34P