rosetta Archives

July 10, 2014December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

Rosetta’s Comet Looks Like A Kidney Flying Through Space

The Rosetta spacecraft captured these pictures of its destination, Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, from 23,000 miles (37,000 kilometers) away on July 4, 2014. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

Up for a little abstract art, anyone? The latest images of the nucleus of Rosetta’s comet makes it look like the celestial object is a kidney. Or perhaps a bean. But regardless of what you “see” in the shape, scientists agree that the comet’s heart certainly isn’t round.

It’s a tantalizing view as the spacecraft speeds towards Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for an August rendezvous. These pictures were taken just a few days ago from 23,000 miles (37,000 kilometers) away, and the spacecraft is drawing noticeably nearer every week. What will a closer view reveal?

“Irregular, elongated, and structured shapes are not uncommon for small bodies such as asteroids and comets,” stated the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in a release. “Of the five cometary nuclei that have been visited by spacecraft in close flybys so far, all are far from spherical.”

To illustrate, we’ve put some examples below of the other comets that have had close-up views:

Jets can be seen streaming out of the nucleus, or main body, of comet Hartley 2 in this image from NASA's EPOXI mission. The nucleus is approximately 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) long and .4 kilometers (.25 miles) across at the narrow "neck." Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UMD — Jets can be seen streaming out of the nucleus, or main body, of comet Hartley 2 in this image from NASA’s EPOXI mission. The nucleus is approximately 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) long and .4 kilometers (.25 miles) across at the narrow “neck.” Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UMD

Halley's Comet, as seen by the European Giotto probe. Credit: Halley Multicolor Camera Team, Giotto Project, ESA — Halley’s Comet, as seen by the European Giotto probe. Credit: Halley Multicolor Camera Team, Giotto Project, ESA

NASA's Stardust-NExT mission took this image of comet Tempel 1 at 8:39 p.m. PST (11:39 p.m. EST) on Feb 14, 2011. The comet was first visited by NASA's Deep Impact mission in 2005. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell. Image brightened and enhanced to show additional detail. — NASA’s Stardust-NExT mission took this image of comet Tempel 1 at 8:39 p.m. PST (11:39 p.m. EST) on Feb 14, 2011. The comet was first visited by NASA’s Deep Impact mission in 2005. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell. Image brightened and enhanced to show additional detail.

comet Borrelly's 5-mile (8-kilometer) long nucleus taken from more than 2,000 miles (3,400 kilometers) away. Picture from NASA's Deep Space 1 probe. Credit: NASA/JPL — Comet Borrelly’s 5-mile (8-kilometer) long nucleus taken from more than 2,000 miles (3,400 kilometers) away. Picture from NASA’s Deep Space 1 probe. Credit: NASA/JPL

The nucleus of Comet 81P/Wild taken by NASA's Stardust probe in 2004. Credit: NASA — The nucleus of Comet 81P/Wild taken by NASA’s Stardust probe in 2004. Credit: NASA

The new pictures from Rosetta come shortly after the spacecraft caught its comet tumbling through space. It’s not really known for sure what the nucleus will look like, although several artists have lent their ideas over the years. Luckily, the European Space Agency probe will give us a very close-up view of the comet, as it plans to deploy a lander called Philae to land on the comet’s surface in November.

Both Rosetta and Philae successfully awoke from hibernation earlier this year and all systems appear to be working well so far as they get ready for the close-up encounter with the comet. The spacecraft have been flying through space for about a decade, and will remain with Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as it sweeps to its closest approach to the sun in 2015, between the orbits of Earth and Mars.

July 3, 2014December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

Rosetta Watches Comet 67P Tumbling Through Space

Animation of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as seen by Rosetta on June 27-28, 2014

This is really getting exciting! ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft (and the piggybacked Philae lander) are in the home stretch to arrive at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 34 days and the comet is showing up quite nicely in Rosetta’s narrow-angle camera. The animation above, assembled from 36 NAC images acquired last week, shows 67P/C-G rotating over a total elapsed time of 12.4 hours. No longer just an extra-bright pixel, it looks like a thing now!

The animation, although fascinating, only hints at the “true” shape of the comet’s nucleus. Reflected light does create a bloom effect in the imaging sensor, especially at such small resolutions, expanding the apparent size of the comet beyond its 4-by-4-pixel size. But rest assured that much, much better images are on the way as Rosetta gets closer and closer.

The spacecraft was about 86,000 km (53,440 miles) from 67P/C-G when the images were acquired. Since that time it has cut that distance in half, and by this weekend it will be less than 36,000 km (22,370 miles) from the comet. After more than a decade of traveling around the inner Solar System Rosetta is finally arriving at its goal! Click here to see where Rosetta is now.

Stay tuned for more exciting updates from Rosetta, and learn more about the mission below:

Source: ESA’s Rosetta blog

Animation credits: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

July 2, 2014December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

How Big is Rosetta’s Comet?

Diagram of Comet 67P/C-G compared to terrestrial landmarks (ESA)

Pretty darn big, I’d say.

The illustration above shows the relative scale of the comet that ESA’s Rosetta and Philae spacecraft will explore “up-close and personal” later this year. And while it’s one thing to say that the nucleus of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is about three by five kilometers in diameter, it’s quite another to see it in context with more familiar objects. Think about it — a comet as tall as Mt Fuji!

Artist's impression (not to scale) of the Rosetta orbiter deploying the Philae lander to comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA–C. Carreau/ATG medialab. — Artist’s impression (not to scale) of the Rosetta orbiter deploying the Philae lander to comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA–C. Carreau/ATG medialab.

At the time of this writing Rosetta is 35 days out on approach to Comet 67P/C-G, at a distance of about 51,000 km (31,700 miles) and closing. Three “big burn” maneuvers have already been performed between May 7 and June 4 to adjust the spacecraft’s course toward the incoming comet, and after smaller ones on June 18 and July 2 there are a total of five more to go. See details of Rosetta’s burn maneuvers here.

As incredibly sensitive as they are, Rosetta’s instruments — which were able to detect the water vapor coming from Comet 67P/C-G from a distance of over 360,000 km — have even sniffed the hydrazine exhaust from its own thruster burns.

Luckily the remaining burns are relatively small compared to the first three, with the final being very brief, so any data contamination by Rosetta’s own exhaust shouldn’t become an issue once the spacecraft has established orbit in August.

Launched in March 2004, ESA’s Rosetta mission will be the first to orbit and land a probe on a comet, observing its composition and behavior as it makes its close approach to the Sun in 2015. Click here to see where Rosetta is right now.

Source: ESA’s Rosetta blog

Note: While 3-5 km seems pretty big (especially when stood on end) comet nuclei can be much larger, 10 to 20 km in diameter up to the enormous 40+ km size of Hale-Bopp. As comets go, 67P/C-G is fairly average. (Except that, come August, it will be the only comet with an Earthly spacecraft in tow!)

June 23, 2014December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

Rosetta Detects Water on its Target Comet

Artist's impression (from 2002) of Rosetta orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA, image by AOES Medialab

It’s no surprise that there is a lot of water in comets. The “dirty snowballs” (or dusty ice-balls, more accurately) are literally filled with the stuff, so much in fact it’s thought that comets played a major role in delivering water to Earth. But every comet is unique, and the more we learn about them the more we can understand the current state of our Solar System and piece together the history of our planet.

ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft is now entering the home stretch for its rendezvous with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in August. While it has already visually imaged the comet on a couple of occasions since waking from its hibernation, its instruments have now successfully identified water on 67P for the first time, from a distance of 360,000 km — about the distance between Earth and the Moon.

The detection comes via Rosetta’s Microwave Instrument for Rosetta Orbiter, or MIRO, instrument. The results were distributed this past weekend to users of the IAU’s Central Bureau of Astronomical Telegrams:

S. Gulkis, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, on behalf of the Microwave Instrument on Rosetta Orbiter (MIRO) science team, reports that the (1_10)-(1_01) water line at 556.9 GHz was first detected in Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko with the MIRO instrument aboard the Rosetta spacecraft on June 6.55, 2014 UT. The line area is 0.39 +/-0.06 K km/s with the line amplitude of 0.48 +/-0.06 K and the line width of 0.76 +/-0.12 km/s. At the time of the observations, the spacecraft to comet distance was ~360,000 km and the heliocentric distance of the comet was 3.93 AU. An initial estimate of the water production rate based on the measurements is that it lies between 0.5 x 10^25 molecules/s and 4 x 10^25 molecules/s.

Although recent images of 67P/C-G seem to show that the comet’s brightness has decreased over the past couple of months, it is still on its way toward the Sun and with that will come more warming and undoubtedly much more activity. These recent measurements by MIRO show that the comet’s water production rate is “within the range of models being used” by scientists to anticipate its behavior.

Rosetta image of Comet 67P/C-G on June 4, 2014, from a distance of 430,000 km. Credits: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

This August Rosetta will become the first spacecraft to establish orbit around a comet and, in November, deploy its Philae lander onto its surface. Together these robotic explorers will observe first-hand the changes in the comet as it makes its closest approach to the Sun in August 2015. It’s going to be a very exciting year ahead, so stay tuned for more!

Learn more about the Rosetta mission here.

Source: ESA’s Rosetta blog

May 16, 2014December 29, 2015 by Fraser Cain

Weekly Space Hangout – May 16, 2014: Shrinking Red Spot

Host: Fraser Cain (@fcain)
Guests: Alessondra Springmann (@sondy), Brian Koberlein (@briankoberlein, briankoberlein.com), Nicole Gugliucci (cosmoquest.org / @noisyastronomer)
Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout – May 16, 2014: Shrinking Red Spot”

May 15, 2014December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

It’s Alive! Rosetta’s Comet Flares As It Approaches The Sun

A close-up of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko taken from 1.24 million miles (2 million km) away. The image was obtained by the Rosetta spacecraft in April 2014 as it approached the comet for a close-up view. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

Wow! This image shows the target comet for the Rosetta mission starting to develop a tail. This bodes well for the European Space Agency spacecraft, which is on its way to study Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko later this year to learn more about the origins of the solar system.

“It’s beginning to look like a real comet,” stated Holger Sierks, principal investigator for OSIRIS (Optical, Spectroscopic and Infrared Remote Imaging System.)

“It’s hard to believe that only a few months from now, Rosetta will be deep inside this cloud of dust and en route to the origin of the comet’s activity,” added Sierks, who is with the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany.

The picture was one of a series taken over six weeks, between March 27 and May 4, as the spacecraft zoomed to within 1.24 million miles (two million kilometers) of the target. You can see the full animation by clicking on the image below.

Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko develops a coma in this sequence of pictures taken by Rosetta, a European Space Agency spacecraft. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA — Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko develops a coma in this sequence of pictures taken by Rosetta (click the picture to see the animation), a European Space Agency spacecraft. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

The comet is now about four times as far from the Sun as the Earth is. Even from afar, the Sun’s heat is warming the comet’s ice, causing dust and vapor to carry out into space — forming the coma. The coma will develop into a long tail when the comet gets even closer to the sun.

Rosetta will be the comet’s companion as it draws closer to the sun; its closest approach will be in August 2015, when it is between the orbits of Earth and Mars. So far, the spacecraft’s 11 instruments appear to be in excellent health, ESA stated, although the agency is remaining cautious as the rendezvous date approaches. The spacecraft will begin orbital insertion activities later this month, and send out its Philae lander in November.

“We have a challenging three months ahead of us as we navigate closer to the comet, but after a 10-year journey it’s great to be able to say that our spacecraft is ready to conduct unique science at comet 67P/C-G,” stated Fred Jansen, ESA’s Rosetta mission manager.

Source: European Space Agency

April 15, 2014December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

Rosetta’s Philae Lander Snaps a Selfie

Rosetta's solar panels as seen by Philae's CIVA imaging system on April 14, 2014. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA

Philae is awake… and taking pictures! This image, acquired last night with the lander’s CIVA (Comet nucleus Infrared and Visible Analyzer) instrument, shows the left and right solar panels of ESA’s well-traveled Rosetta spacecraft, upon which the 100-kilogram Philae is mounted.

Philae successfully emerged from hibernation on March 28 via a wake-up call from ESA.

After over a decade of traveling across the inner Solar System, Rosetta and Philae are now in the home stretch of their ultimate mission: to orbit and achieve a soft landing on comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It will be the first time either feat has ever been attempted by a spacecraft. Read more here.

Source: ESA Rosetta Blog

April 3, 2014December 23, 2015 by Bob King

Fly to Rosetta’s Comet with this New Interactive Visualization

Frame from the Rosetta Mission simulation shows the probe and comet when closest to the sun in late 2015. Credit: INOVE

Hang onto your space helmets. With a few moves of the mouse, you can now follow the European Rosetta mission to its target comet with this interactive 3-D simulator. Go ahead and give it a click – it’s live! The new simulator was created by INOVE Space Models, the same group that gave us the 3-D solar system and Comet ISON interactive models.

The embedded version gives you a taste, so be sure to also check out the full-screen version. You can either click play to watch the mission from start to finish or you can drop it at key points by selecting from list of 11 highlights on the left side of your screen. A tick-tock at the bottom of the screen helps reference the time and what the spacecraft is doing at that moment in the video.

To interact with the model, simply click the screen. The action stops, allowing you to zoom in and out by scrolling; to change orbital viewpoints hold down the mouse button and drag. So easy!

Simulator view of Rosetta's first Earth flyby / gravity assist in March 2005. The probe flew by Earth three times and Mars once to conserve fuel and send it beyond the asteroid belt to rendezvous with Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: INOVE — Simulator view of Rosetta’s first Earth flyby / gravity assist in March 2005. The probe flew by Earth three times and Mars once to conserve fuel and send it beyond the asteroid belt to rendezvous with Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: INOVE

I like the realism of the simulation, the attention paid to the planets’ variable spin rates and orbital periods and how well model illustrates the complicated maneuvers required to “fling” the probe to Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. And I do mean fling. Watching the video from a face-on solar system perspective I was struck by how Rosetta’s flight path resembled a spiral after repeated gravity assists by Mars and Earth.

*Rosetta heads toward Comet C-G after its final Earth flyby in this face-on view. Credit: INOVE*

Whether you’re a teacher or an armchair space enthusiast looking for an easy-to-understand, graphic way to find out how Rosetta will meet its target, I doubt you’ll find a more effective tool.

March 28, 2014December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

ESA Awakens Rosetta’s Comet Lander

Little Philae is awake! ESA sent a wake-up call to the 100-kg (220-lb) lander riding aboard the Rosetta spacecraft this morning at 06:00 GMT, bringing it out of its nearly 33-month-long slumber and beginning its preparation for its upcoming (and historic) landing on the surface of a comet in November.

Unlike Rosetta, which awoke in January via a pre-programmed signal, Philae received a “personal wake-up call” from Earth, 655 million kilometers away.

Hello, world! ESA's Rosetta and Philae comet explorers are now both awake and well! — Hello, world! ESA’s Rosetta and Philae comet explorers are now both awake and well!

A confirmation signal from the lander was received by ESA five and a half hours later at 11:35 GMT.

After over a decade of traveling across the inner Solar System, Rosetta and Philae are now in the home stretch of their ultimate mission: to orbit and achieve a soft landing on the inbound comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It will be the first time either feat has ever been attempted — and hopefully achieved — by a spacecraft.

After Rosetta maneuvers to meet up with the comet in May and actually enters orbit around it in August, it will search its surface for a good place for Philae to make its landing in November.

With a robotic investigator both on and around it, 67/P CG will reveal to us in intimate detail what a comet is made of and really happens to it as it makes its close approach to the Sun.

“Landing on the surface is the cherry on the icing on the cake for the Rosetta mission on top of all the great science that will be done by the orbiter in 2014 and 2015. A good chunk of this year will be spent identifying where we will land, but also taking vital measurements of the comet before it becomes highly active. No one has ever attempted this before and we are very excited about the challenge!”
– Matt Taylor, Rosetta project scientist

Meanwhile, today’s successful wake-up call let the Rosetta team know Philae is doing well. Further systems checks are planned for the lander throughout April.

Watch an animation of the deployment and landing of Philae on comet 67/P CG below:

Source: ESA’s Rosetta blog

Want to welcome Rosetta and Philae back on your computer? Download a series of ESA’s “Hello, World” desktop screens here.

March 27, 2014December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

Rosetta Spacecraft Spies Its Comet As It Prepares For An August Encounter

The Rosetta spacecraft saw its destination (Comet 67P/Churymov-Gerasimenko) on March 20, 2014 from about three million miles (five million kilometers) away. The comet is in the small circle next to the globular star cluster M107. ESA/MPS for OSIRIS-Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

As Rosetta limbers up for its close-up encounter with a comet, we have visual confirmation that it’s on the right track! The comet spied its destination — Comet 67P/Churymov-Gerasimenko — using its OSIRIS wide-angle camera and narrow-angle camera on March 20 and March 21.

“Finally seeing our target after a 10 year journey through space is an incredible feeling,” stated OSIRIS principal investigator Holger Sierks from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany. “These first images taken from such a huge distance show us that OSIRIS is ready for the upcoming adventure.”

The image comes as Rosetta is preparing its science instruments for its encounter in August.

“Currently, Rosetta is on a trajectory that would, if unchanged, take it past the comet at a distance of approximately 50 000 km and at a relative speed of 800 m/s. A critical series of manoeuvres beginning in May will gradually reduce Rosetta’s velocity relative to the comet to just 1 m/s and bring it to within 100 km by the first week of August,” the European Space Agency stated.

Here’s an animation of how big the comet will appear to Rosetta as it gets closer:

“Between May and August the 4 km-wide comet will gradually ‘grow’ in Rosetta’s field of view from appearing to have a diameter of less than one camera pixel to well over 2000 pixels – equivalent to a resolution of around 2 m per pixel – allowing the first surface features to be resolved.”

For more information on the science commissioning, check out the Rosetta blog.