MODULE 3: COMETS, ASTEROIDS AND METEORS

Comets (a.k.a. Dirty Snowball) - comes from the Greek word meaning "hair.”
 loose collections of ice, dust, and small rocky particles whose orbits are usually very long, narrow ellipses.
A Comet’s Head
– Outer layer= Coma (water vapor, CO2, and other gases)
– Solid inner core= Nucleus (frozen ice, silicate, gas and dust )
Silicates - minerals that contain the elements silicon, oxygen, and at least one metal
Comet’s Tail - gas (ion) tail and dust tail
 Scientists also discovered a faint sodium tail, a third type of comet tail to add to the well-known dust and plasma (or ion)
tails.
When does a comet gets its tail?
• As a comet approaches the sun heats up, some of its gas and dust stream outward, forming a tail.
• A comet’s tail can be more than 100 million kilometers long.
Why does the tail of a comet point away from the sun? Answer: Tails point away from the sun because of the force of the solar wind.
Origin of Comets
Kuiper belt-doughnut - shaped region that extends beyond Neptune’s orbit to about 100 times Earth’s distance from the sun.
• Oort cloud - spherical region of comets that surrounds the solar system out to more than 1,000 times the distance between
Pluto and the sun.
2 Types of Comets
1. Short-period comets - come from Kuiper Belt and take less than 200 years to complete an orbit around the Sun.
2. Long-period comets - come from the Oort Cloud and take more than 200 years to complete an orbit around the Sun.
Famous Comets
1. Comet Halley - the most famous comet in history. It reappears every 76 years. Its next appearance is in 2061.
2. Comet Hale-Bopp - exceptionally large size
 July 23, 1995- an unusually large and bright comet was seen outside of Jupiter's orbit by Alan Hale of New Mexico and
Thomas Bopp of Arizona. It will not appear again for another 2,400 years.
 It was visible even through bright city skies, and may have been the most viewed comet in recorded history.
3. Comet Hyakutake-On January 30, 1996, Yuji Hyakutake (pronounced "hyah-koo-tah-kay"), an amateur astronomer
from southern Japan, discovered a new comet using a pair of binoculars.
4. Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9-Between July 16 and July 22, 1994, more than 20 fragments of Comet Shoemaker-Levy
9 collided with the planet Jupiter. Astronomers Carolyn and Eugene Shoemaker and David Levy discovered the
comet in 1993. It was the first collision of two Solar System bodies ever to be recorded.
METEOROID, METEOR & METEORITE
Meteor – a light phenomenon or a streak of light that occurs when a meteoroid burns up as it enters the Earth’s
atmosphere. Also called as “shooting star” or “falling star”
Meteoroid – a broken up rock and dust from either a comet, asteroid, the moon or from Mars.
- it can be as small as a grain of sand or as big as a boulder.
 When it enters Earth’s atmosphere, the air in front of the meteoroid heats up, causing the materials to burn up.
 From Earth, these glowing materials appear as a streak of light or a fast-moving bright object that appears to have a tail just
like a comet.
Meteorite -meteoroids that pass through the atmosphere and hit Earth’s surface.
 Meteorites are of importance to scientist in studying the occurrence of different elements and compounds on Earth.
Classifications of Meteorite
1. Stony – made of rock, but can also contain small amounts of iron. Types: Chondrites and Achondrites
2. Stony-iron – formed by mixing between metal cores and the rocky magmas within asteroids.
- they are extremely rare. Types: Pallasites and Mesosiderites
3. Iron - made up of pure nickel and iron metal with some impurities such as graphite and the mineral troilite which
may have originated from within the metallic cores of asteroids.
 Iron meteorites fall very rarely, but are easier to find because they can survive re-entry relatively intact, are
very resistant to weathering and look very different to normal rocks.
 The largest meteorites ever discovered.
 Ancient cultures used to use metal from these iron meteorites to make tools and jewelry.

Meteoroid - outer space

Meteor – atmosphere (Earth)

Meteorite –
Earth’s surface or crust
Meteor shower – a celestial event in which a number of meteors are observed to radiate, or originate from one point in the
night sky.
 The meteor shower is named after the constellation where they seem to originate from, but this does not mean that the
meteoroids come from associated constellation.
Note: A meteor and a meteor shower are light phenomena; they are not stars.
 A meteor shower happens when Earth passes through the path of a comet. When this happens, the bits of comet debris, most
no larger than a grain of sand, create streaks of light in the night sky as they burn up in Earth’s atmosphere.
 However, during a meteor shower, tens to hundreds of meteors can be seen each hour.
 Many of these meteor showers can be predicted and occur at the same time.
Factors on how well you can see meteors in the sky:
1. air pollution 5. light pollution
2. the time of the day 6. weather conditions
3. size of the meteoroids 7. source of the meteoroids (comet vs asteroid)
4. the chemical composition of the meteoroid itself.
Importance of Meteorites
1. Stellar Evolution
Some meteorites contain grain of dust (“stardust”) that were produced by stars before the formation of our Solar
System. Studies of these grains can increase our understanding of stars and their role in the universe.

2. Age and Composition of the Solar System

We can estimate the age and bulk chemical composition of the Solar System and the order in which different
components in meteorite – and the Solar System – formed, by by measuring the amounts of various elements in meteorites.

3. Solar System Evolution

The analysis of different types of meteorites and their components in our cutting-edge research laboratories (ASU
Center for Meteorite Studies) is leading to new knowledge of the earliest conditions in our Solar System, and determining the
pathways to forming habitable worlds.

4. Geologic History of Earth and the Moon

Large meteorite impacts have shaped the face of our planet and the Moon through time. Many scientists believe that
a very large impact was even responsible for the formation of the Moon.
5. History of Life
Meteorites may have brought to Earth the chemicals necessary for the origin of life. Large meteorite impacts, like
the one – 65 million years ago that killed off the dinosaurs, may lead to major extinctions that influenced the course of life on
our planet.