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IAUC 9121: COMET C/2010 D2 (WISE); COMET 67P/CHURYUMOV-GERASIMENKO

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                                                  Circular No. 9121
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
CBAT Director:  D. W. E. Green, Room 209; Department of
 Earth and Planetary Sciences; Harvard University;
 20 Oxford St.; Cambridge, MA  02138; U.S.A.
CBAT@IAU.ORG; CBATIAU@EPS.HARVARD.EDU
URL http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/cbat.html  ISSN 0081-0304


COMET C/2010 D2 (WISE)
     A. Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, reports that an object
discovered on 12-micron WISE satellite images (discovery 
observation tabulated below) shows a 'hazy' coma 20" in diameter 
with a 25" tail, with 24-micron images showing a coma diameter of 
about 30".  After posting on the 'NEOCP' webpage, P. Birtwhistle 
(Great Shefford, U.K., 0.40-m reflector) notes that his CCD images 
from Mar. 4.9 show a diffuse object of diameter 9" (total mag 19.5), 
possibly elongated in p.a. 75 deg.

     2010 UT             R.A. (2000) Decl.       Observer          
     Feb. 25.68995    3 22 22.09   +71 54 30.9   WISE

The available astrometry, the following parabolic orbital elements 
by B. G. Marsden, and an ephemeris appear on MPEC 2010-E12.

     T = 2010 July  2.834 TT          Peri. = 143.791
                                      Node  = 317.646   2000.0
     q = 3.66164 AU                   Incl. =  57.971


COMET 67P/CHURYUMOV-GERASIMENKO
     M. R. Combi, University of Michigan; J.-L. Bertaux and E. 
Quemerais, Service d'Aeronomie, CNRS/UVSQ; and J. T. T. Maekinen, 
Finnish Meteorological Institute, report that the Solar Wind 
Anisotropies (SWAN) camera on the Solar and Heliospheric 
Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft, located at the earth-sun L_1 
Lagrange point, made comet-dedicated observations of comet 67P in 
2009 March and April.  SWAN makes daily full-sky images of hydrogen 
Lyman-alpha.  The following water-production rates were determined 
from the hydrogen Lyman-alpha brightness and distribution on each 
date, along with the heliocentric distance (r) of the comet:  Mar. 
2.53 UT, r = 1.248 AU, Q(H_2O) = 4.8 x 10**(27) molecules/s; 3.95, 
1.248, 4.8; 5.36, 1.249, 4.9; 6.78, 1.250, 5.2; 8.20, 1.251, 4.3; 
9.61, 1.253, 5.3; 11.03, 1.254, 5.8; 12.45, 1.256, 6.5; 13.86, 
1.258, 6.0; 15.28, 1.261, 8.0; 16.70, 1.263, 8.9; 18.11, 1.266, 8.1; 
19.53, 1.270, 7.6; 20.95, 1.273, 7.5; 22.35, 1.276, 6.8; 23.77, 
1.280, 7.0; 25.19, 1.284, 5.3; 26.60, 1.288, 7.8; 28.02, 1.293, 8.4;
Apr. 8.35, 1.335, 7.9; 9.77, 1.341, 11.1; 11.18, 1.348, 6.1; 12.60, 
1.354, 4.3; 14.01, 1.361, 5.9; 15.42, 1.368, 5.3; 16.84, 1.375, 4.8; 
18.26, 1.382, 3.3; 19.68, 1.389, < 2.5.  The water production rates 
have uncertainties resulting from the calibration, background 
subtraction, and model parameters, as well as from the instrument
noise and the formal model inversion.   Taken together, these yield 
total uncertainties at a level of about 30 percent.

                      (C) Copyright 2010 CBAT
2010 March 4                   (9121)            Daniel W. E. Green

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