[Previous] | [Session 44] | [Next]
M. V. Sykes (U. Ariz.), R. M. Cutri, J. W. Fowler (Cal Tech), D. J. Tholen (U. Hawaii), M. F. Skrutskie (U. Mass.)
The Two-Micron All Sky Survey is scanning the entire sky in the near-infrared (J,H,Ks) from facilities in the northern and southern hemispheres over a four year period. Through the period of the Second Incremental Data Release (Cutri et al. 2000, go to www.ipac.caltech.edu), 2MASS serendipitously scanned the positions of 54 periodic comets and 27 parabolic or hyperbolic comets. Of these, 5 and 3 were detected, respectively, and are listed below. C/LINEAR (1998 M2) was detected 24 days before discovery and C/Mueller (1998 K1) was detected 42 days before discovery. With the exception of P/Giacobini-Zinner, all periodic comets having heliocentric distances of less than 3 AU were detected. Chiron was observed on March 27 and April 23, 1998 and appeared unusually bright in the Ks band on both nights. Its mean colors (J-H=0.30+/-0.06; H-Ks=0.30+/-0.07) were significantly redder than has been previously observed (e.g., mean J-H=0.29+/-0.02; H-K=0.06+/-0.02 from Davies et al. [Icarus 134, 213-227, 1998] for observations in 1996 and 1997). This work is supported by NASA Planetary Astronomy grant NAG5-7758 and JPL.
| Detected Comets | R | Delta |
| Chiron | 8.902 | 8.132 |
| 8.932 | 7.953 | |
| P/Harrington-Abell | 2.040 | 1.578 |
| P/Howell | 1.501 | 1.298 |
| P/Lovas 1 | 1.703 | 0.951 |
| P/Wolf-Harrington | 2.325 | 1.539 |
| C/LINEAR (1998 M2) | 2.918 | 2.260 |
| C/Meunier-Dupouy (1998 J2) | 3.750 | 3.359 |
| C/Mueller (1998 K1) | 3.672 | 3.014 |
| 3.567 | 3.292 |
If you would like more information about this abstract, please follow the link to http://www.ipac.caltech.edu/2mass/releases/second/doc/explsup.html. This link was provided by the author. When you follow it, you will leave the Web site for this meeting; to return, you should use the Back comand on your browser.