Comet news, features and articles

Latest about Comets

The Bernardinelli-Bernstein comet takes 5.5 million years to complete its orbit.

Never-before-seen colossal comet on a trek toward the sun

By Stephanie Pappas published

Only one week after astronomers noticed a moving object in the sky, they've identified it as a long-periodicity comet from the Oort Cloud.

Comets
An artist's impression of what the surface of the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov might look like.

Interstellar interloper 2I/Borisov may be the most pristine comet ever observed

By Charles Q. Choi published

The first known interstellar comet to visit our solar system may be the most pristine ever found, never passing near a star until visiting our own, researchers say.

Comets
This series of images of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko was captured by the Rosetta spacecraft's OSIRIS narrow-angle camera on Aug. 12, 2015, a few hours before the comet reached perihelion, or the closest point to the sun along its 6.5-year orbit.

The 'rubber ducky' comet is glowing

By Rafi Letzter published

The rubber ducky comet is glowing, but you can't see it. New analysis of data from the Rosetta probe shows an ultraviolet aurora all around the speeding object.

Comets
On July 18, 2020, astrophotographer Evan Zucker and his wife, Paula, drove three hours to the Mojave Desert north of Desert Center, California, to see Comet NEOWISE. "The comet itself was an very obvious naked eye object, even all the way down to the horizon, but the ion tail was a challenge to perceive naked eye," Zucker said. They used a Sony a7iii camera with a Sony 85mm f/1.4 GM lens, set to f/1.4 and ISO 800, mounted on a 6-in. Celestron telescope to provide tracking. The single 13-second exposure was processed in Adobe Lightroom and Topaz AI De-Noise.

The curtain is about to come down on Comet NEOWISE

By Joe Rao published

The brightest comet to appear in Northern Hemisphere skies in nearly a quarter of a century will soon be ending its run as a naked-eye object.

Comets
Comet NEOWISE, as photographed by Joy Ng, a multimedia producer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Comet NEOWISE: 10 big questions (and answers) about the icy wanderer

By Chelsea Gohd published

Comet NEOWISE has returned to the skies and is delighting skywatchers. So what makes this comet so special?

Comets
Processed data from the WISPR instrument on NASA’s Parker Solar Probe shows great detail in the twin tails of Comet NEOWISE, as seen on July 5, 2020. The lower, broader tail is the comet’s dust tail, while the thinner, upper tail is the comet’s ion tail.

Dazzling Comet NEOWISE could be an astronomical bonanza

By Mike Wall published

Astronomers are buzzing about Comet NEOWISE, which observers under clear, dark skies in the Northern Hemisphere can currently see with the naked eye.

Comets
The International Space Station seems to cross paths with Comet NEOWISE in the morning sky over Rome, Italy, in this photo captured by astrophysicist Gianluca Masi of the Virtual Telescope Project, on July 7, 2020.

Don't miss Comet NEOWISE in the evening sky now. It won't be back for 6,800 years.

By Tariq Malik published

Comet NEOWISE is now visible in the evening sky for stargazers. It won't be back for 6,800 years.

Comets
This Hubble Space Telescope image of comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) was taken on April 23, 2020.

Sun-watching spacecraft just might fly through tail of Comet ATLAS in rare encounter

By Meghan Bartels published

Comets
A comet that passed by Earth in December 2018.

Newfound Comet ATLAS is getting really bright, really fast

By Joe Rao published

For years, amateur astronomers have been waiting for a bright, naked-eye comet to pass by Earth — and finally, such an object may have arrived.

Comets
A single frame Rosetta navigation camera image of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

Rosetta's 'rubber ducky' comet changed color as it neared the sun. Here's why.

By Rafi Letzter published

As Rosetta's comet got near enough to the sun for frost to evaporate off its surface, a color-changing water and dust cycle began that shuffled its colors around.

Comets
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