Carbon and oxygen production rates for Comet Kohoutek (1973 XII).
Abstract
Data obtained during sounding-rocket observations of the 1304-A atomic oxygen resonance line and the 1657-A atomic carbon resonance line in the coma of comet Kohoutek are reduced, and production rates are derived for both species. Isodensity contour plots and radial brightness plots are constructed; scale lengths and luminosities are determined for the O and C comas at a heliocentric distance of 0.43 AU. Computations yield production rates of 1.47 by 10 to the 29th power atoms/sec for O and 8.6 by 10 to the 28th power atoms/sec for C. Potential sources of error are noted, and problems of fitting the data to the water-ice clathrate model of the nucleus are discussed. The results indicate that carbon in some form or forms was a major constituent of the comet and that the O/C ratio was about 2, in agreement with analyses of the composition of carbonaceous chondrites and solar abundances in general.
- Publication:
-
The Astrophysical Journal
- Pub Date:
- January 1977
- DOI:
- Bibcode:
- 1977ApJ...211..294O
- Keywords:
-
- Abundance;
- Atomic Spectra;
- Kohoutek Comet;
- Rocket Sounding;
- Ultraviolet Spectra;
- Astronomical Spectroscopy;
- Carbon;
- Flow Velocity;
- Gas Evolution;
- Hydrogen Atoms;
- Mass Ratios;
- Oxygen Atoms;
- Photoionization;
- Astrophysics