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The Split Comets: Gravitational Interaction Between the Fragments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 August 2015

Z. Sekanina
Z. Sekanina*
Affiliation:
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.A.

Extract

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The n-body computer program by Schubart and Stumpff (1966) has been slightly modified to study the gravitational interaction between two fragments of a split comet nucleus in the sun's gravitational field. All calculations refer to the orbit of Comet West (1976 VI), the velocity of separation of the fragments is assumed to be equal in magnitude to the velocity of escape from the parent nucleus, and the numerical integration of the relative motion of one fragment (called the companion) with respect to the other (principal fragment) is carried over the period of 200 days from separation.

Type
Part VI: Comets
Information
Symposium - International Astronomical Union , Volume 81: Dynamics of the Solar System , 1979 , pp. 311 - 314
Copyright
Copyright © Reidel 1979 

References

Schubart, J. and Stumpff, P.: 1966, Veröffentl. Astron. Rechen-Inst. Heidelberg No. 18, pp. 1–31.Google Scholar
Sekanina, Z.: 1977, Astrophys. Letters 18, pp. 55–59.Google Scholar
Sekanina, Z.: 1978, Icarus 33, pp. 64–71.Google Scholar