pakatan HarApan: Adakah ia sebuah KOMET ? Adakah ia ASTEROID ? 'Ganjil' BATU ruang 6 ekor ditemui oleh NASA . . .

Image from hubblesite.org (think IN pictures @1WORLDCommunity)

SitiWanMahani - “objek pelik dan ganjil” mengejutkan dan tidak pernah lagi dilihat dengan 6 ekor telah ditangkap oleh Teleskop Angkasa Hubble NASA dalam lingkaran asteroid sistem suria kita yang di antara orbit Marikh dan Musytari.

Ahli-ahli sains adalah “benar-benar terperanjat” kerana mereka telah cuba untuk mencari penjelasan yang mencukupi untuk keluar dari rupa DUNIA ini “objek pelik dan ganjil,” kata penyiasat utama dari Universiti California di Los Angeles, David Jewitt, dalam akhbar NASA melepaskan.

Walaupun asteroid biasa muncul sebagai cahaya titik kecil, yang ditetapkan P/2013 P5 mempunyai 6 ekor seperti komet debu terpancar daripadanya.

“Yang lebih menakjubkan, struktur ekornya berubah secara dramatik dalam masa 13 hari kerana ia ‘belches’ keluar debu. Itu juga kita terperangkap dengan kejutan. Adalah sukar untuk percaya bahawa kita sedang melihat asteroid.”

Asteroid adalah sisa-sisa pembentukan planet terganggu terletak di tali pinggang antara Marikh dan Musytari. Objek pepejal yang boleh menjadi planet tetapi proses itu telah diganggu oleh tarikan graviti Musytari. Asteroid berbeza dari komet kerana mereka didapati lebih dekat dengan matahari dan tidak menghasilkan suasana yang sementara. Bagi komet, mereka disifatkan sebagai yang agak kecil, pada masa-masa aktif, objek yang ais boleh menguap dalam cahaya matahari yang membentuk suasana yang boleh dilihat di seluruhnya ia dipanggil ‘koma’ atau ‘ekor’.

Pasukan penyelidikan itu percaya bahawa asteroid berputar sehingga permukaannya terbang selain debu ejecting dalam letusan episod yang membentuk ekor yang kelihatan dan membuat ia kelihatan seperti sebuah komet.

“Jika kadar putaran asteroid ini menjadi cukup pantas graviti lemah asteroid tidak lagi akan dapat untuk memegang ia bersama-sama. Debu mungkin runtuhan ‘downslope’ ke arah khatulistiwa, dan mungkin pecah dan jatuh, akhirnya hanyut ke dalam ruang untuk membuat ekor,” kata Jewitt .

Is it a comet? Is it asteroid? ‘Freakish’ six-tail space rock

discovered by NASA . . .

A startling and never yet seen “weird and freakish object” with six tails has been captured by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in our solar system’s asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

Scientists were “literally dumbfounded” as they were trying to find an adequate explanation for out of- this world appearance of this “weird and freakish object,” said the lead investigator of the University of California at Los Angeles, David Jewitt, in NASA’s press-release.

While normal asteroids appear as tiny points of light, the designated P/2013 P5 has six comet-like tails of dust radiating from it.

“Even more amazing, its tail structures changed dramatically in just 13 days as it belches out dust. That also caught us by surprise. It's hard to believe we're looking at an asteroid.”

Asteroids are remnants of disrupted planet formation located in the belt between Mars and Jupiter. These solid objects that could have become planets but the process was interrupted by the gravitational pull of Jupiter. Asteroids differ from comets as they are found closer to the sun and do not produce a temporary atmosphere. As for comets, they are characterized as relatively small, at times active, objects whose ices can vaporize in sunlight forming a visible atmosphere around it called a ‘coma’ or a ‘tail.’

The research team believes that the asteroid is rotating so much that its surface is flying apart ejecting dust in episodic eruptions that form the visible tails and make it look like a comet.

“If the asteroid's spin rate became fast enough the asteroid's weak gravity would no longer be able to hold it together. Dust might avalanche downslope towards the equator, and maybe shatter and fall off, eventually drifting into space to make a tail,” Jewitt said.

Image from hubblesite.org (think IN pictures @1WORLDCommunity)

Dalam proses berputar objek dengan lingkungan 700 kaki telah hilang hanya sebahagian kecil daripada besar-besaran, yang dipanggil 100 hingga 1,000 tan debu, kata penyelidik.

“Orbit asteroid boleh membuat ahli keluarga asteroid Flora. Ini bermakna bahawa ia adalah mungkin sebahagian daripada perlanggaran asteroid yang berlaku kira-kira 200 juta tahun yang lalu” kata penyiasat utama.

Serpihan dari perlanggaran mengikuti orbit yang sama, dipanaskan kepada sebanyak 815.5 Celsius. Ini menunjukkan bahawa asteroid terdiri daripada batuan metamorf, yang tidak mampu memegang ais, menunjukkan bahawa ia adalah satu asteroid dan bukan sebuah komet.

Asteroid mula terpancar debu 5 bulan lalu, berkata kajian yang disiarkan dalam isu minggu ini ‘Astrophysical Journal Letters’.

Ia pertama kali ditemui oleh teleskop kaji selidik Pan-STARRS di Hawaii sebagai objek luar biasa yang berpandangan kabur, manakala beberapa ekor ditemui oleh Hubble pada 10 September. Imej yang diambil oleh Teleskop kemudian pada 23 September menunjukkan objek yang berbeza secara drastik mempesonakan penyelidik.

“Kami benar-benar mengetuk keluar,” kata Jewitt, sambil menambah bahawa objek itu kelihatan seolah-olah keseluruhan struktur telah mengayunkan sekitarnya selepas pemerhatian sebelumnya.

Penyelidik berkata perpecahan putaran mesti menjadi fenomena biasa dalam lingkaran asteroid, menunjukkan bahawa ini mungkin cara yang asteroid kecil mati.

“Dalam bidang astronomi, di mana anda mencari satu, anda akhirnya menemui berbagai-bagai lagi” kata Jewitt. “Ini hanya satu objek yang hebat untuk kita, dan hampir pasti yang pertama daripada banyak lagi yang akan datang”.

In the process of spinning the object with a 700-foot radius has lost only a small fraction of its mass, supposedly 100 to 1,000 tons of dust, the researchers said.

“The orbit of the asteroid could make it a member of the Flora asteroid family. This means that it is probably a piece from an asteroid collision that occurred roughly 200 million years ago” said the lead investigator.

The fragments from the collision are following similar orbits, heated to as much as 815.5 Celsius. This indicates that the asteroid is made up of metamorphic rocks, which are not capable of holding ice, suggesting that it is an asteroid and not a comet.

The asteroid started radiating dust five months ago, said the study published in this week’s issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

It was first spotted by Pan-STARRS survey telescope in Hawaii as an unusually fuzzy-looking object, while the multiple tails were discovered by Hubble on September 10. The images taken by Hubble later on September 23 showed a drastically different object dazzling the researchers.

“We were completely knocked out,” Jewitt said, adding that the object looked as if the entire structure had swung around after the previous observation.

Researchers said rotational breakup must be a common phenomenon in the asteroid belt, suggesting that this may be the way that small asteroids die.

“In astronomy, where you find one, you eventually find a whole bunch more,” Jewitt said. “This is just an amazing object to us, and almost certainly the first of many more to come.”