Cometary science after Rosetta

Jones, G. H.; Knight, Matthew M.; Fitzsimmons, A.; Taylor, Matt

doi:10.1098/rsta.2017.0001

Cited by 7 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 37 publications

(39 reference statements)

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“…Between August 2014 and its controlled end-of-mission crash on 30 September 2016, the European Space Agency mission Rosetta accompanied comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P) on its journey toward the inner solar system, through perihelion at 1.24 astronomical units (AU), and back out again (Jones et al 2017;Taylor et al 2017). During this period, Rosetta monitored in situ the neutral and plasma environment of the comet and its interaction with the solar wind, using dedicated instruments (Glassmeier 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Solar wind charge exchange in cometary atmospheres III. Results from the Rosetta mission to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Wedlund,

Behar,

Nilsson

et al. 2019

Preprint

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Context. Solar wind charge-changing reactions are of paramount importance to the physico-chemistry of the atmosphere of a comet. The ESA/Rosetta mission to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P) provides a unique opportunity to study charge-changing processes in situ. Aims. To understand the role of these reactions in the evolution of the solar wind plasma and interpret the complex in situ measurements made by Rosetta, numerical or analytical models are necessary. Methods. We used an extended analytical formalism describing solar wind charge-changing processes at comets along solar wind streamlines. The model is driven by solar wind ion measurements from the Rosetta Plasma Consortium-Ion Composition Analyser (RPC-ICA) and neutral density observations from the Rosetta Spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analysis-Comet Pressure Sensor (ROSINA-COPS), as well as by charge-changing cross sections of hydrogen and helium particles in a water gas. Results. A mission-wide overview of charge-changing efficiencies at comet 67P is presented. Electron capture cross sections dominate and favor the production of He and H energetic neutral atoms (ENAs), with fluxes expected to rival those of H + and He 2+ ions. Conclusions. Neutral outgassing rates are retrieved from local RPC-ICA flux measurements and match ROSINA estimates very well throughout the mission. From the model, we find that solar wind charge exchange is unable to fully explain the magnitude of the sharp drop in solar wind ion fluxes observed by Rosetta for heliocentric distances below 2.5 AU. This is likely because the model does not take the relative ion dynamics into account and to a lesser extent because it ignores the formation of bow-shock-like structures upstream of the nucleus. This work also shows that the ionization by solar extreme-ultraviolet radiation and energetic electrons dominates the source of cometary ions, although solar wind contributions may be significant during isolated events.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Solar wind charge exchange in cometary atmospheres III. Results from the Rosetta mission to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Wedlund,

Behar,

Nilsson

et al. 2019

Preprint

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“…Second, the very nature of cometary activity means that material from the surface, and sometimes the sub-surface, of the cometary object is being launched into space. There, it becomes subject to an array of remote and in situ analysis methods that cannot be applied to the inert solid surface of an inactive asteroid [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Asteroid–comet continuum objects in the solar system

Hsieh

2017

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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In this review presented at the Royal Society meeting, ‘Cometary science after Rosetta’, I present an overview of studies of small solar system objects that exhibit properties of both asteroids and comets (with a focus on so-called active asteroids). Sometimes referred to as ‘transition objects’, these bodies are perhaps more appropriately described as ‘continuum objects’, to reflect the notion that rather than necessarily representing actual transitional evolutionary states between asteroids and comets, they simply belong to the general population of small solar system bodies that happen to exhibit a continuous range of observational, physical and dynamical properties. Continuum objects are intriguing because they possess many of the properties that make classical comets interesting to study (e.g. relatively primitive compositions, ejection of surface and subsurface material into space where it can be more easily studied, and orbital properties that allow us to sample material from distant parts of the solar system that would otherwise be inaccessible), while allowing us to study regions of the solar system that are not sampled by classical comets. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Cometary science after Rosetta’.

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“…-Unifying physics and technology in the light of Maxwell's equations [5]. -Cometary science after Rosetta [6].…”

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confidence: 99%