Sun ID: 11975

3,000 Comets for SOHO

Released on September 15, 2015

Since its launch nearly 20 years ago, NASA and the European Space Agency's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory has spotted 3000 comets. The mission's The Large Angle and Spectrometric Coronagraph (LASCO) instrument blocks out the bright solar disk, making it easier to see the corona of plasma and dust around the Sun, normally only visible during solar eclipses. This instrument also provides a very large field of view of the region around the Sun.

This visualization utilizes SOHO data from 1998 - 2010 and shows over 2000 comets. Comets that were first observed by SOHO carry no labels, and comets witnessed by not discovered by the spacecraft are represented with their labels. Trails on the comets are color coded based on family: yellow - unaffiliated comets, red - Kreutz group, green - Meyer group, blue - Marsden, cyan - Kracht, and magenta - Kracht 2.

The visualizations without narration or music are also available.

Credits

Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Lead Visualizer
Genna Duberstein (USRA): Lead Producer
Karl Battams (Naval Research Laboratory): Lead Narrator
Karl Battams (Naval Research Laboratory): Lead Scientist

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11975

Mission:
SOHO

Goddard TV Tape:
G2015-069 -- 3000 Comets for SOHO

Keywords:
SVS >> Comet
SVS >> HDTV
SVS >> SOHO
NASA Science >> Sun
SVS >> Kreutz Path
SVS >> Sungrazing Comets