The persistent activity of Jupiter-family comets at 3-7AU

Kelley, M.S., Fernández, Y.R., Licandro, J., Lisse, C.M., Reach, W.T., A'Hearn, M.F., Bauer, J., Campins, H., Fitzsimmons, A., Groussin, O., and others. (2013) The persistent activity of Jupiter-family comets at 3-7AU. Icarus, 225 (1). pp. 475-494. ISSN 0019-1035. (doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2013.04.012) (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:52275)

The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided.
Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2013.04.012

Abstract

We present an analysis of comet activity based on the Spitzer Space Telescope component of the Survey of the Ensemble Physical Properties of Cometary Nuclei. We show that the survey is well suited to measuring the activity of Jupiter-family comets at 3-7. AU from the Sun. Dust was detected in 33 of 89 targets (37. ±. 6%), and we conclude that 21 comets (24. ±. 5%) have morphologies that suggest ongoing or recent cometary activity. Our dust detections are sensitivity limited, therefore our measured activity rate is necessarily a lower limit. All comets with small perihelion distances (q<. 1.8. AU) are inactive in our survey, and the active comets in our sample are strongly biased to post-perihelion epochs. We introduce the quantity {small element of}f?, intended to be a thermal emission counterpart to the often reported Af?, and find that the comets with large perihelion distances likely have greater dust production rates than other comets in our survey at 3-7. AU from the Sun, indicating a bias in the discovered Jupiter-family comet population. By examining the orbital history of our survey sample, we suggest that comets perturbed to smaller perihelion distances in the past 150. yr are more likely to be active, but more study on this effect is needed. © 2013 Elsevier Inc.

Item Type:	Article
DOI/Identification number:	10.1016/j.icarus.2013.04.012
Additional information:	Unmapped bibliographic data: LA - English [Field not mapped to EPrints] J2 - Icarus [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742-2421, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Department of Physics, University of Central Florida, 4000 Central Florida Blvd., Orlando, FL 32816-2385, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Instituto de AstrofÃsica de Canarias, C/VÃa LÃ¡ctea s/n, 38205 La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Applied Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University, 11100 Johns Hopkins Rd., Laurel, MD 20723, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, Universities Space Research Association, MS 211-3, Moffett Field, CA 94035, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 4800 Oak Grove Dr., Pasadena, CA 91109, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Astrophysics Research Centre, School of Physics and Astronomy, Queen's University Belfast, Belfast BT7 1NN, United Kingdom [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Aix Marseille UniversitÃ©, CNRS, LAM (Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille) UMR 7326, 13388 Marseille, France [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Centre for Astrophysics and Planetary Science, University of Kent, Ingram Building, Canterbury, Kent CT2 7NH, United Kingdom [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii, 2680 Woodlawn Dr., Honolulu, HI 96822, United States [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Max-Planck-Institut fÃ¼r Sonnensystemforschung, Max-Planck-Str. 2, 37191 Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany [Field not mapped to EPrints] AD - Konkoly Observatory, Po Box 67, Budapest 1525, Hungary [Field not mapped to EPrints] DB - Scopus [Field not mapped to EPrints]
Uncontrolled keywords:	Comets, Comets, Coma, Comets, Dust, Infrared observations
Subjects:	Q Science > QB Astronomy
Divisions:	Divisions > Division of Natural Sciences > Physics and Astronomy
Depositing User:	Stephen Lowry
Date Deposited:	08 Dec 2015 22:08 UTC
Last Modified:	05 Nov 2024 10:38 UTC
Resource URI:	https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/52275 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Lowry, S.C..

Creator's ORCID:	https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5605-4329
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