Bizarre Six-Tailed Asteroid Looks Like A Comet, Object Orbit Surprises Astronomers
Normal asteroids appear as tiny points of light. But this asteroid, designated P/2013 P5, has six comet-like tails of dust radiating from it like the spokes on a wheel. It was first spotted in August of this year as an unusually fuzzy-looking object by astronomers using the Pan-STARRS 1 telescope in Hawaii [1].
Because nothing like this has ever been seen before, astronomers are scratching their heads to find an adequate explanation for its mysterious appearance.
The multiple tails were discovered in Hubble images taken on 10 September 2013. When Hubble returned to the asteroid on 23 September, its appearance had totally changed. It looked as if the entire structure had swung around.
“We were literally dumbfounded when we saw it,” said lead investigator David Jewitt of the University of California at Los Angeles, USA. “Even more amazingly, its tail structures change dramatically in just 13 days as it belches out dust. That also caught us by surprise. It’s hard to believe we’re looking at an asteroid.”
This is a diagram of the structure seen around an active asteroid designated P/2013 P5. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope imaged six dust tails in September 2013. One interpretation is that the asteroid’s rotation rate has increased to the point where dust is falling off the surface along the equator and escaping into space. The pressure of sunlight then sweeps the dust into long tails. The entire structure rotates like a wheel.
Credit: NASA, ESA, D. Jewitt (University of California, Los Angeles), J. Agarwal (Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research), H. Weaver (Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory), M. Mutchler (STScI), and S. Larson (University of Arizona)
The asteroid could possibly have been spun up to a high speed as pressure from the Sun’s light exerted a torque on the body. If the asteroid’s spin rate became fast enough, Jewitt said, the asteroid’s weak gravity would no longer be able to hold it together. Dust might avalanche down towards the equator, and maybe shatter and fall off, eventually drifting into space to make a tail. So far, only a small fraction of the main mass, perhaps 100 to 1000 tonnes of dust, has been lost. The asteroid is thousands of times more massive, with a radius of up to 240 metres.
Jewitt’s interpretation implies that rotational breakup may be a common phenomenon in the asteroid belt; it may even be the main way in which small asteroids “die” [4]. “In astronomy, where you find one, you eventually find a whole bunch more,” Jewitt said. “This is just an amazing object to us, and almost certainly the first of many more to come.”
The paper from Jewitt’s team appears online in the 7 November issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
[1] The comet was discovered by Micheli et al. on 27 August 2013. It was spotted in observations from 18 August 2013. The discovery was announced in a Minor Planet Electronic Circular.
[2] Agarwal calculated that the first ejection event occurred on 15 April, and the last one on 4 September 2013. Other eruptions occurred on 18 July, 24 July, 8 August, and 26 August 2013.
[3] A less likely option is that this emission is a result of water ice sublimating. Water ice can survive within the asteroid belt, although only at the outskirts or if buried deep enough within a large enough asteroid to be shielded. However, P5 is likely made of metamorphic rocks, making it incapable of holding ice in the same way that comets do. This, coupled with P5′s orbit and its very small size, makes it very unlikely that its mass loss would be due to ice sublimation.
[4] This is not the first time that Hubble has observed a strange asteroid. In 2010, Hubble spotted a strange X-shaped asteroid (heic1016). However, unlike P/2013 P5, this was thought to have been formed by a collision. Later that year astronomers observed asteroid (596) Scheila, an object with a tail that was surrounded by a C-shaped cloud of dust (opo1113a). Again, this asteroid was thought to be the result of a collision between Scheila and a much smaller body — only the second time that such an event has been spotted.
David Jewitt
University of California at Los Angeles
Nicky Guttridge
ESA/Hubble, Public Information Officer
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I am always intrigued by these comets and asteroids but hell who do you really believe when it comes to this stuff? Come on baby light my fire!
December 26, 2013:doomsday
http://zanbaq1.livejournal.com/
http://emam-mahdi-1431.blogfa.com/
nibiru =comet ison
Nothing like signing on just to SPAM all the posts!!!
Wow, this is amazing – I have just flown from South Africa to Nigeria on business. Landed in Nigeria and guess what? It’s all over the news that the stupid Americans who voted Obama as their black cunning president cannot get a simple website called Obamacare working!!!
To make it worse the stupid Americans could not develop the website themselves so the employed Canadians to build and manage the website. The Nigerians are laughing their hearts out!
It just shows you that the whole world thinks Obama is a coconut black thug.
And don’t laugh if you’re an American! All you Americans are dumb stupid fat lazy and pretty sleazy!
Let me go drink a beer and enjoy laughing at the American bastards!
“@America must burn” America is the term for a continent that stretches from the Arctic to the Antarctica. It is comprised of North America, South America, Central America, and the United States. Many countries are included on that continent.
Will You get education before screaming your hate. We do not live in a democracy in the United States. We are a republic. No citizen vote has ever been counted in the election of the president of the private corporation of “the Virginia” company (better known as the Government of the United States Citizens) .
The private company was set up and established by the crown empire and King James I. They tell us what to do under threat of death. We do not run this country. The crown empire runs this country and blames us for their laws and regulations of racism.
I hope you do not stay stupid since you obviously have money for travel across the seas.
Good News! Nigeria is still a pit. While America still smells nice, looks pretty and we’re fat BECAUSE we live in a place where you can GROW FOOD. Laugh all you want jack-a@@ I think I’ll make myself a toaster strudel or 2, and then…throw one out. Bah Hahahahah!
…now that’s an american!!!
um , prove that asteroids exhibit “tails.”
re: flying from SA to nigeria: are you perhaps heading there to withdraw 1.2billion US from national bank of nigeria?
I head Gen. Planet J. Niburu is waiting to help. He was friend of former president seeking to take 14.7 billion US out of country and needs only you give 2.3000 USD from you as security
Of course the ‘experts’ haven’t got a clue. They’re still using an outdated gravitational model for their cosmology instead of an electrical one. They still believe gravity is an attractive force and the speed of light is constant!
I wonder if they have a good close up and are sure of the make up, what if it is something different? Cassini shoots out massive jets of water from friction with its parent, and sister moon’s , which surprised the hell out of people.
Maybe it is a combination of an impact with an asteroid/comet remnants. Who knows, it is an interesting object to watch and eventually learn what it is. Would it not be nice to have remote space drones that would motor to what ever catches your fancy? I would love it personally
Mark of the Beast? 666?
I wonder if 137.5 would apply to the asteroid’s tails.