Astronomers find unexpected comets in outer reaches of solar system
Using data from the WISE space telescope, astronomers have found that there are more comets lurking in the far reaches of the solar system than they had predicted.
Scientists found that there are about seven times more long-period comets measuring at least 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) across than had been predicted previously. They also found that long-period comets are on average up to twice as large as “Jupiter family comets,” whose orbits are shaped by Jupiter’s gravity and have periods of less than 20 years. Researchers also observed that in eight months, three to five times as many long-period comets passed by the Sun than had been predicted.
These are comets whose orbits never allow them to come close to the inner solar system, which allows them to remain puffy and large.
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Using data from the WISE space telescope, astronomers have found that there are more comets lurking in the far reaches of the solar system than they had predicted.
Scientists found that there are about seven times more long-period comets measuring at least 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) across than had been predicted previously. They also found that long-period comets are on average up to twice as large as “Jupiter family comets,” whose orbits are shaped by Jupiter’s gravity and have periods of less than 20 years. Researchers also observed that in eight months, three to five times as many long-period comets passed by the Sun than had been predicted.
These are comets whose orbits never allow them to come close to the inner solar system, which allows them to remain puffy and large.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
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3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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Puffy and large means just full of water. Something easy to harvest way out there.
“These are comets whose orbits never allow them to come close to the inner solar system, which allows them to remain puffy and large.”
A list of these long period (>200 year orbit but <1000 year) comets is here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_long-period_comets
One can define "come close to the inner solar system" as less than the distance of the asteroid belt (~3 AU). I count ~100 of these comets with a perihelion of <3 AU out of the list of 116. 36 of the comets on this list pass less than 1 AU from the Sun.
Thus, I do not think your statement is correct.
The time frame of a mere 200 years seems infinitesimally short in the long time of the solar system (5 billion years), so they should have passed millions of times through the inner solar system over that period.
Also look at this list.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_near-parabolic_comets
One of those has an orbit period estimated to be 130,000,000 years! That one would have passes as close as 4.2 AU ~38 times over the solar system age.