Captured Comet Becomes Moon of Jupiter 108
An anonymous reader writes 'Jupiter's gravity captured a comet in the mid-20th century, holding it in orbit as a temporary moon for 12 years. The comet, named 147P/Kushida-Muramatsu, is the fifth body known to have been pulled by Jupiter from its orbit around the Sun. The discovery adds to our understanding of how Jupiter interferes with objects from the 'Hilda group,' which are asteroids and comets with orbits related to Jupiter's orbit.'
Re:The comet's shape (Score:1, Interesting)
The squares of the first 3 positive integers, you mean.
1 is NOT a prime number.
Re:Good catch Jupiter (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, it did. A planet like Jupiter may actually have been essential for complex life to develop on Earth.
Maybe. However in addition to capturing bodies that could have threatened earth, Jupiter also attracts objects from the Oort Cloud etc. that would not have been any threat to Earth otherwise. The jury is still out on whether Jupiter is actually a net positive.
Wait a second... article may be overstating case (Score:3, Interesting)
The article says that the comet had an orbit around Jupiter of 12 years. Well Jupiter has an orbital period around the sun of almost exactly 12 years also. Does this mean that the comet was in orbit around Jupiter or that it was merely in an orbit that was very similar to Jupiter's (in relation to the sun).
I believe that there is a NEO that basically does the same thing around earth. It travels in an orbit around the sun just slightly different from the earth so that sometimes it is in front of the earth on it's path and sometimes it is behind. From our perspective it makes a complex lissajous (spelling?) track. But I seem to remember it is definitely NOT "orbiting" the earth.
The article doesn't specifically state whether or not the comet is gravitationally bound to Jupiter which I guess is the definition of "orbiting" (I'm not a professional astronomer). Even if it was orbiting Jupiter, with a period of 12 years it was very loosely bound. In any case, how was it brought into Jupiter's proximity? How did it get ejected? Where is it now?
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:This should be NASA's focus (Score:2, Interesting)
NASAs goals and objectives are not solely to protect earth from dangerous rocks. It is a research and exploration agency. I can see that if you're terrified of dangerous space rocks, you'd want to see that mission changed. I simply think it's a bad idea to redirect all of your resources to fend off one threat which has a minuscule year to year statistical likelihood. Sure, don't ignore the threat, but don't give up on all the other exploration you're doing.
But then again, you stick to your priorities. I can respect that