[meteorite-list] Deep Space 1 Captures Best-Ever View Of Comet's Core

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:49:03 2004
Message-ID: <200109251813.LAA10695_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Contact: JPL/Martha J. Heil (818) 354-0850
         NASA/Dolores Beasley (202) 358-1753

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE September 25, 2001

NASA SPACERAFT CAPTURES BEST-EVER VIEW OF COMET'S CORE

     In a risky flyby, NASA's ailing Deep Space 1 spacecraft
successfully navigated past a comet, giving researchers the
best look ever inside the glowing core of icy dust and gas.

     The space probe's close encounter with comet Borrelly
provided the best-resolution pictures of the comet to date.
The already-successful Deep Space 1, without protection from
the little-known comet environment, whizzed by just 2,200
kilometers (1,400 miles) from the rocky, icy nucleus of the
10-kilometer-long (more than 6-mile-long) comet.

     Exceeding the team's expectations of how this elderly
spacecraft would perform, the intrepid spacefarer sent back
black-and-white photos of the inner core of the comet. It
also measured the types of gases and infrared waves around the
comet, and how the gases interacted with the solar wind.

     "Deep Space 1 plunged into the heart of comet Borrelly
and has lived to tell every detail of its spine-tingling
adventure!" said Dr. Marc Rayman, the project manager of Deep
Space 1 at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena,
Calif. "The images are even better than the impressive images
of comet Halley taken by Europe's Giotto spacecraft in 1986."

     Rayman added, "After years of nursing this aged and
wounded bird along -- a spacecraft not structured to explore
comets, a probe that exceeded its objectives more than two
years ago -- to see it perform its remarkably complex and
risky assignment so well was nothing short of incredible."

     "It's mind-boggling and stupendous," said Dr. Laurence
Soderblom, the leader of Deep Space 1's imaging team, and a
geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, Flagstaff, Ariz.
"These pictures have told us that comet nuclei are far more
complex than we ever imagined. They have rugged terrain,
smooth rolling plains, deep fractures and very, very dark
material."

     Scientists also realized that Borrelly was different than
they expected as Deep Space 1 flew through the coma, the cloud
of dust and gas surrounding the nucleus. They had expected
that the solar wind would flow symmetrically around the cloud,
with the nucleus in the center.

     Instead, they found that though the solar wind was
flowing symmetrically around the cloud, the nucleus was off to
one side shooting out a great jet of material forming the
cloud that makes the comet visible from Earth. "The formation
of the coma is not the simple process we once thought it was,"
said Dr. David Young of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
leader of the team that made the measurements. "Most of the
charged particles are formed to one side, which is not what we
expected."

     Deep Space 1 completed its primary mission testing ion
propulsion and 11 other advanced, high-risk technologies in
September 1999. NASA extended the mission, taking advantage of
the ion propulsion and other systems to undertake this chancy
but exciting encounter with the comet.

     Deep Space 1, launched in October 1998 as part of NASA's
New Millennium Program, is managed by JPL for NASA's Office of
Space Science in Washington. The California Institute of
Technology manages JPL for NASA.

     More information can be found on the Deep Space 1
Internet home page at: http://nmp.jpl.nasa.gov/ds1/ .

                # # # # #
Received on Tue 25 Sep 2001 02:13:50 PM PDT