Comet Tempel-Tuttle and the Leonid meteors

doi:10.1016/0019-1035(81)90198-6

Icarus

Volume 47, Issue 3, September 1981, Pages 492-499

https://doi.org/10.1016/0019-1035(81)90198-6 Get rights and content

Abstract

The distribution of dust surrounding periodic comet Tempel-Tuttle has been mapped by analyzing the associated Leonid meteor shower data over the 902–1969 interval. The majority of dust ejected from the parent comet evolves to a position lagging the comet and outside the comet's orbit. The outgassing and dust ejection required to explain the parent comet's deviation from pure gravitational motion would preferentially place dust in a position leading the comet and inside the comet's orbit. Hence it appears that radiation pressure and planetary perturbations, rather than ejection processes, control the dynamic evolution of the Leonid particles. Significant Leonid meteor showers are possible roughly 2500 days before or after the parent comet reaches perihelion but only if the comet passes closer than 0.025 AU inside or 0.010 AU outside the Earth's orbit. Although the conditions in 1998–1999 are optimum for a significant Leonid meteor shower, the event is not certain because the dust particle distribution near the comet is far from uniform. As a by-product of this study, the orbit of comet Tempel-Tuttle has been redetermined for the 1366–1966 observed interval.

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Cited by (67)

When comets get old: A synthesis of comet and meteor observations of the low activity comet 209P/LINEAR
2016, Icarus
Citation Excerpt :
In particular, we note four of these comets – namely 209P/LINEAR, 252P/LINEAR, 289P/2003 WY25 (Blanpain) and 300P/2005 JQ5 (Catalina) – can produce meteor showers currently observable at Earth. Meteor showers are caused by cometary dusts ejected in past orbits of the parent, therefore meteor observations have the potential of enhancing our understanding of the physical history of the parent, as demonstrated in the investigation of the present and past activity of 55P/Tempel-Tuttle (e.g. Yeomans, 1981; Brown, 1999) and a couple of potential dormant comets (e.g. Babadzhanov et al., 2012; Kokhirova and Babadzhanov, 2015). We then model the May 25 Gemini image.
It is speculated that some weakly active comets may be transitional objects between active and dormant comets. These objects are at a unique stage of the evolution of cometary nuclei, as they are still identifiable as active comets, in contrast to inactive comets that are observationally indistinguishable from low albedo asteroids. In this paper, we present a synthesis of comet and meteor observations of Jupiter-family Comet 209P/LINEAR, one of the most weakly active comets recorded to-date. Images taken by the Xingming 0.35-m telescope and the Gemini Flamingo-2 camera are modeled by a Monte Carlo dust model, which yields a low dust ejection speed (1/10 of that of moderately active comets), dominance of large dust grains, and a low dust production of $0.4 kg s^{- 1}$ at 19 d after the 2014 perihelion passage. We also find a reddish nucleus of 209P/LINEAR that is similar to D-type asteroids and most Trojan asteroids. Meteor observations with the Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar (CMOR), coupled with meteoroid stream modeling, suggest a low dust production of the parent over the past few hundred orbits, although there are hints of a some temporary increase in activity in the 18th century. Dynamical simulations indicate 209P/LINEAR may have resided in a stable near-Earth orbit for $\sim 10^{4}$ yr, which is significantly longer than typical JFCs. All these lines of evidence imply that 209P/LINEAR as an aging comet quietly exhausting its remaining near surface volatiles. We also compare 209P/LINEAR to other low activity comets, where evidence for a diversity of the origin of low activity is seen.
Observations of the 2001 Leonid meteor shower using VHF meteor radar
2008, Icarus
Citation Excerpt :
It has been noted, however, that high meteor fluxes at the peak of the Leonid shower are composed of material deposed in the last few revolutions of the comet, and that the years where the Leonid shower appears stronger coincide with the return of the comet to perihelion (Brown et al., 1997, 1998), although this in not always the case. Yeomans (1981) recognizes that the mechanisms that control the dynamic evolution of the Leonids particles are radiation pressure and planetary perturbations, rather than just the ejection processes. This generates a dust trail which has a non-uniform particle distribution, and raises the difficulty of modeling the comet's orbit and the distribution of the particles.
Every year the Earth crosses or passes near one of the dust trails left by Comet 55P/Tempel–Tuttle in its pass through the Solar System every 33.2 years. This produces a meteor shower Commonly called the Leonid. The 2001 Leonid meteor shower is one of the strongest in recent years. We present observations made by the 50 MHz all-sky meteor radar located at the Platteville Atmospheric Observatory in Colorado (40° N, 105° W). The spatial and temporal distributions of the meteor activity detected by the radar during the 2001 Leonid shower differs from the observed sporadic activity detected by VHF radars. Estimation of the radiant flux of the meteor shower of the shower by a well-known methodology is presented, and the intensity of the phenomena is discussed.
Micrometeorites from Central Antarctic snow: The CONCORDIA collection
2007, Advances in Space Research
We recovered micrometeorites from surface snow layers near the French-Italian station CONCORDIA. The unique weather and isolation conditions of Dome C allowed us to recover micrometeorites that are much better preserved than those extracted from blue ice fields. We have identified a new population of friable fine-grained micrometeorites; the absence of such particles in previous collections can be explained by their destruction by mechanical processes. In contrast to previous collections of micrometeorites, the particles from CONCORDIA Collection are characterized by a high content of Fe-sulfides and an undepleted CI elemental abundance pattern of their fine-grained matrix. These features suggest that micrometeorites from Dome C snow have endured much lower alteration from terrestrial weathering, unlike the micrometeorites recovered from near the margin of the Antarctic ice sheet (Adélie Land). The CONCORDIA particles have well constrained terrestrial ages and, given the low Dome C precipitation rate, the central regions of Antarctica provide a unique opportunity to search for particles from historical meteor showers.
A synthetical index of the potential threats about intense activities of meteors
2006, New Astronomy
Citation Excerpt :
In addition, a tremendous amount of meteoroids might be encountered in a short time. In Leonids 1966, a ZHR of about 150,000 meteors was ever recorded (Yeomans, 1981; Jenniskens, 1995; McNaught and Asher, 1999; Wu, 2002). In despite of considering the new results after the Leonids 2001, Jenniskens (2002) concluded that the level should have been closer to 15,000 than 150,000, people often think that Leonids is one of the most dangerous meteor streams, even under the normal conditions (Jenniskens et al., 1998; McBride and McDonnell, 1999; Foschini, 2002).
In the present age, several techniques for the application to the observation of meteors and meteor showers have been developed in modern meteor astronomy. The initial definition for a meteor storm based on the visual observation with a Zenithal Hourly Rate of above 1000 seems insufficient now, since it only means a storm or burst of meteors in numbers and means that an eyewitness could have a chance to see a spectacular meteor show. Up to now, peoples have also recorded the meteoric flashes on the Moon during the Leonid meteor showers. Especially, the increasing activities of mankind in space for scientific, commercial and military purposes, have led to an increase in the problems concerning the safety of the satellites, space stations and astronauts. How the intense activity of a meteor storm is defined and forecast, some new points of view are needed. In this paper, several aspects about the intensity of the meteor storm are analyzed, including the number, mass, impulse, energy, electric charge, different purposes and different physical meanings. Finally, a synthetical index denoting the activity and potential threat of an intense meteor shower is suggested.
Analysis of historical meteor and meteor shower records: Korea, China, and Japan
2005, Icarus
Citation Excerpt :
According to Wu (2002), Leonid showers would never be seen for more than about four consecutive years. Yeomans (1981) on the other hand has suggested that significant Leonid meteor showers were maintained for roughly 2500 days. We have looked for this kind of change in meteor activity in Korean records, wishing to estimate the evolution time of identified periodic meteor showers.
We have compiled and analyzed historical Korean meteor and meteor shower records in three Korean official history books, Samguksagi which covers the three Kingdoms period (57 B.C.–A.D. 935), Goryeosa of Goryeo dynasty (A.D. 918–1392), and Joseonwangjosillok of Joseon dynasty (A.D. 1392–1910). We have found 3861 meteor and 31 meteor shower records. We have confirmed the peaks of Perseids and an excess due to the mixture of Orionids, north-Taurids, or Leonids through the Monte Carlo test. The peaks persist from the period of Goryeo dynasty to that of Joseon dynasty, for almost one thousand years. Korean records show a decrease of Perseids activity and an increase of Orionids/north-Taurids/Leonids activity. We have also analyzed seasonal variation of sporadic meteors from Korean records. We confirm the seasonal variation of sporadic meteors from the records of Joseon dynasty with the maximum number of events being roughly 1.7 times the minimum. The Korean records are compared with Chinese and Japanese records for the same periods. Major features in Chinese meteor shower records are quite consistent with those of Korean records, particularly for the last millennium. Japanese records also show Perseids feature and Orionids/north-Taurids/Leonids feature, although they are less prominent compared to those of Korean or Chinese records.
Comparison between Leonid meteor shower observations during 1998-2000
2002, Planetary and Space Science
Observations for the Leonid meteor shower from the Gaomeigu station of Yunnan Observatory during 1998–2000 are analyzed in this paper. We introduce a new statistical quantity zenithal hourly mass rates (ZHMR) to deal with the mass flow of a meteoroid stream. The variations of r, ZHR and ZHMR are given. During our observations, ZHMR had often a value of the order of 10⁻⁶– $10^{−3} g/km^{2} h$ . The variation of r may be more strong and frequent in 1998 than in 1999, but in most cases, it was about 2.0. Interesting phenomena like filamentary structure was observed in ZHR and mass influx profiles. In our observations, the filamentary structure has no periodic variation. In general, the ZHMR and ZHR would show different behaviour and go to their maximum at different times. The ZHMR may become a new statistic to support comparisons between different observers, and might be a more useful quantity for predictions. In 1999, the dust trails of 4- and 5-revolution (rev) seem to leave nothing at the exact predicted time. At most, we estimate the ZHR introduced solely by the 4-rev. trail should not be over 50.

View all citing articles on Scopus

^☆: Paper presented at IAU Colloquium 61, “Comets: Gases, Ices, Grains, and Plasma”, Tucson, Arizona, March 11–14, 1981.

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Comet Tempel-Tuttle and the Leonid meteors☆

Abstract

On the orbit of the November meteors

Mon. Not. Roy. Astron. Soc.

Meteors, meteor showers and meteorites in the middle ages from European medieval sources

J. History Astron.

Historical records of meteor showers in China, Korea, and Japan

Smithsonian Contrib. Astrophys.

On the orbits of the comet of 1366 A.D. and of 868 A.D.

Japan. J. Astron. Geophys.

Investigation of perturbed motion of the Leonid meteor stream

Observatio cometae A. 1699 in suprema puppi navis Argus

Miscellanea Berolinensia

Sources of interplanetary dust

Sur les étoiles filantes du 13 Novembre et du 10 Août

Comptes Rendus

Meteor Astronomy