Kelley, Michael S.; Fernández, Yanga R.; Licandro, J.; Lisse, Carey M.; Reach, William T.; A’Hearn, Michael F.; Bauer, James; Campins, Humberto; Fitzsimmons, Alan; Groussin, Olivier; Lamy, Philippe L.; Lowry, Stephen C.; Meech, Karen J.; Pittichová, Jana; Snodgrass, Colin; Toth, Imre; Weaver, Harold A.
Bibliographical reference
Icarus, Volume 225, Issue 1, p. 475-494.
Description
We analyze the activity of 89 comets observed with the Spitzer Space
Telescope.We conclude that at least 24% of Jupiter-family comets are
active at 3–7 AU.Comets are more likely to be active post
perihelion.We find that all survey targets comets with perihelion inside
of 1.8 AU are inactive.
Related projects
Minor Bodies of the Solar System
This project studies the physical and compositional properties of the so-called minor bodies of the Solar System, that includes asteroids, icy objects, and comets. Of special interest are the trans-neptunian objects (TNOs), including those considered the most distant objects detected so far (Extreme-TNOs or ETNOs); the comets and the comet-asteroid