Study of the halley comet near tail glow by Vega-2 three-channel spectrometer data from 10 March 1986

• Published in: Advances in space research Vol. 31; no. 5; pp. 1285 - 1290
• Main Authors: Guineva, V.Chr, Stoeva, P.Vl, Werner, R
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 01-01-2003
• ISSN: 0273-1177; 1879-1948
• DOI: 10.1016/S0273-1177(02)00942-0

Two-dimensional intensity distributions of the dust continuum, the neutrals and the CO
+ ion at comparatively undisturbed conditions, taken on 10 March 1986 are applied in order to investigate the near tail of the Halley comet region. Data from the three-channel spectrometer on board Vega-2 are used.
An overall decrease of the dust continuum intensity profile with a gradient -.86±.21 is obtained. Superimposed maxima are observed, probably resulting from the dust jets and the nucleus rotation. Such behaviour is not observed in the OH and C
2 distributions. The neutrals' intensity decreases with the increase of the distance to the nucleus.
The mean CO
+ ion velocity is estimated to lie in the interval from -100 to -140 km/s, on the basis of the (3,0) band form and some band intensity ratios. The presence of spatial (possibly dust) sources at distances about 2×10
5 km from the nucleus is affirmed and noticeable changes in the scales of the order of 10 minutes are observed in the CO
+ distributions.