Bibcode
Kidger, M. R.; Serra-Ricart, M.; Bellot Rubio, L.; Torres-Chico, R.; Casas, R.; Chinarro, L. M.; Gomez, A.; Lopez, S.; Manade, L.; Shulman, L.
Bibliographical reference
American Astronomical Society, 187th AAS Meeting, #42.10; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 27, p.1338
Advertised on:
12
1995
Citations
1
Refereed citations
1
Description
CCD monitoring of Comet Hale-Bopp (1995 O1) has been carried out on more
than 50 nights using the 82cm IAC-80 Telescope at Teide Observatory
(Tenerife, Spain), operated by the Instituto de Astrofísica de
Canarias. A combination of deep exposures of the extended coma in BVRI
(up to 2 hours total exposure in a single filter) and near nucleus
imaging has been carried out. Major jets were observed in late August,
late September and mid-October which were followed from first detection
to complete disappearance. We present a video of the evolution of the
different events which shows both similarities and important differences
between their morphology and evolution. The August and October events
feature a structure with a straight, highly collimated jet of increasing
projected length with time and a so-called ``spiral arm" which in all
three jets ends in a similar PA, close to the anti-solar direction.
These jets we interpret on the basis of various models in an attempt to
derive basic parameters such as the rotation and axial inclination, as
well as the position of the three sites on the nucleus. There is strong
evidence that the three events are caused by different active points on
the nucleus, sited at different latitudes. We also present light curves
of the comet for different apertures (near-nucleus and total coma) which
are linked to the different jet events.