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VIRTUALISATION Don't miss Comet Lulin approaching Earth: It's green!
VIRTUALISATION Don't miss Comet Lulin approaching Earth: It's green! | Don't miss Comet Lulin approaching Earth: It's green! |
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| by William Atkins | |
| Thursday, 05 February 2009 | |
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On July 11, 2007 Chinese astronomer Quanzhi Ye was observing the sky from his location at the Lulin Observatory at Sun Yat-sen University (Guangzhou, China). Ye was using sky charts from Lin Chi-Sheng (Institute of Astronomy, National Central University, Jung-Li, Taiwan). The nineteen-year-old meteorology student was looking at stars when he suddenly noticed one of them wasn’t a star. It was a comet. And a very special comet, too, for two reasons. First, it was an undiscovered comet. As the result of this first-time sighting, the non-periodic comet is named after the observatory in which it was discovered. Second, it has a very distinctive color. The Lulin Comet (also called Comet C/2007 N3) is described by its discoverer Quanzhi Ye as, “It is a green beauty that could become visible to the naked eye any day now.” [Science @ NASA (February 4, 2009): "Green Comet Approaches Earth”] The comet is quickly approaching Earth. Its closest approach will be on February 24, 2009, at about 0.41 astronomical units (AU) from Earth. One AU is the average distance between the Earth and the Sun. Page two states the approximate distance away the Comet Lulin will be to Earth. |
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