Sentences with phrase «of icy asteroids»

In 2002, astrophysicists spotted a strange tail on asteroid 133P Elst Pizaro, the result of the icy asteroid turning to water vapor.

Not exact matches

Still, Chapman says, he would not be surprised to see water ice on asteroids, adding that the distinction between comets, traditionally considered to be icy, and asteroids, which have been largely thought of as rocky, is becoming increasingly blurred.

Such worlds may include Mars, the asteroid Vesta, the dwarf planet Ceres or the icy moons of Jupiter or Saturn.

Some of it is sublimation: an icy asteroid transforming directly into water vapor as it makes its way toward the sun.

However, there were other possible sources of water: interplanetary dust particles produced by cometary activity and asteroid collisions, icy rings, or one of the 60 Jovian satellites.

The Grand Tack nicely explains the formation of Mars, the layout of the asteroid belt and the delivery of water to Earth via icy asteroids.

The results are somewhat unexpected because comets, the icier cousins of asteroids, are known typically to sprout jets and plumes, while objects in the asteroid belt are not.

«This is the first time water vapor has been unequivocally detected on Ceres or any other object in the asteroid belt and provides proof that Ceres has an icy surface and an atmosphere,» said Michael Küppers of ESA in Spain, lead author of a paper in the journal Nature.

New Horizons also could potentially take a close - up look at a smaller, more ancient object much farther out in the Kuiper Belt: the disk - shaped region beyond the orbit of Neptune believed to contain comets, asteroids and other small, icy bodies.

What little rocky material occurs in today's ring system probably is the debris of collisions between icy ring particles and asteroids and comets swept up by the planet's huge gravitational field, says Canup.

Of those deportees, about 4 % came from within about 375 million kilometers of the sun, rendering them rock - or metal - rich bodies like asteroids rather than icy orbs like comets, the researchers report online ahead of print in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical SocietOf those deportees, about 4 % came from within about 375 million kilometers of the sun, rendering them rock - or metal - rich bodies like asteroids rather than icy orbs like comets, the researchers report online ahead of print in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societof the sun, rendering them rock - or metal - rich bodies like asteroids rather than icy orbs like comets, the researchers report online ahead of print in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societof print in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societof the Royal Astronomical Society.

It envisions the great reshuffling as a brief, violent affair that not only put the outer planets where they are today but also created the Kuiper belt of small icy bodies beyond Neptune, gave the planets scores of oddly orbiting moons, and bombarded the solar system with a rain of asteroids and comets so fierce that it would have cooked all but the deepest subterranean life on early Earth.

Previous spacecraft launched under New Frontiers include New Horizons, which surveyed Pluto and is now due to visit MU69, an icy object in the farthest reaches of the solar system; Juno, now in orbit around Jupiter; and OSIRIS - REx, launched last year, which will collect samples from an asteroid and return them to Earth.

Since «Oumuamua is a more even mix of ice and rocks, it's likely it came from the middle part of a solar system, similar to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter that features a mixture of icy and rocky asteroids.

In addition to rocky asteroids and icier bodies further out from the Sun, many agglomerated into larger planetesimals that eventually collided to form planets like the Earth, and more than 250 minerals, including olivine and zircon, developed within the planetesimals with the help of melting, collisional shocks, and reactions with water.