HARROW: Comets used to be described as dirty snowballs of rock and ice with a few organic chemicals thrown in. This plan was later changed when Rosetta spacecraft finally set its lander on comet 67P/Churyumov–Geras imenko. And after six months of continuously orbiting around the comet, the unmanned spaceship has more things to say about comets.
The European Space Agency (ESA) revealed some data from the Rosetta mission as gathered by its 7 instruments. One of the secrets they found about comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko is that it has various collection of terrains and processes that change their behavior as the comet moves closer to the Sun.
Another finding suggests that the comet is not a compact ball but rather has a “rubber duck” shape. It also has a small lobe measuring 2.6 x 2.3 x 1.8 km (1.6 x 1.4 x 1.1 mi) and the larger one 4.1 x 3.3 x 1.8 km (2.5 x 2.0 x 1.1 mi). There are also cracks running parallel on the comet’s surface and scientists attributed the cracks to the cooking and heating of the comet.
The comet is that it’s a lot spongier than expected. The comet weighs 11 billion tons with a volume of volume is 21.4 km3 (5.1 mi3) and a density of 470 kg/m3. This means it’s 70 to 80 percent porous with an internal structure of ice dust and small voids.
The Rosetta team also mapped the surface of the comet with 19 regions named after Egyptian deities. Some regions on the comet’s surface are covered with dust expelled from the interior as ice boils away in jets and falls back in dune-like ripples. There is an interesting region that features “goosebumps” on a very steep cliff faces.
The instruments used by Rosetta probe also identified sublimated water jetting out, carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide.
Matt Taylor, ESA’s Rosetta project scientist described the mission saying, “Rosetta is essentially living with the comet as it moves towards the Sun along its orbit, learning how its behavior changes on a daily basis and, over longer timescales, how its activity increases, how its surface may evolve, and how it interacts with the solar wind.”
