Sarah Watson
33 posts
Sarah Watson
@Sarah_R_Watson
3rd year PhD student at @UniofReading. Studying solar wind interactions with minor planetary bodies☀️☄️
@mathewjowens @L_A_Barnard Great! Will be interesting to see if comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS's ion tail will be detected near Earth under these circumstances... iopscience.iop.org/article/10.384…
Back from Namibia, we have brought a lot of images of comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. The GIF shows the comet on September 30, when the solar wind gave the comet a special appearance. Image taken at Farm Tivoli with a FSQ 106/3.8. The animation covers a period of 30 minutes.
It is totally awesome to see a comet from orbit. The perspective of rising through the atmosphere on edge is truly unique from our vantage point. The comet tail is still too dim to see with your eyes, but it is heading towards the sun and growing brighter every day. This comet is known as C2023-A3 or Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. @dominickmatthew used math (go figure) and our orbital geometry to figure out where to point our cameras and was the first to get a good photo (x.com/dominickmatthe…). Using Matthew’s technique, I will photograph every day to see what develops in the tail structure. Currently, there appears to be a forward directed “tail” that I am not certain is real or an artifact from shooting through 4 window panes. Time will tell if this structure brightens. Stay tuned. Nikon Z9, 200mm f2, 1/8th sec, ISO 25600, processed with Photoshop.
The tail of this comet was torn off as it passed the heliospheric current sheet; a solar-wind structure where the magnetic field flips polarity. @Sarah_R_Watson has used these observations to show that data assimilation improves solar-wind modelling. iopscience.iop.org/article/10.384…
Stargazers are being urged to photograph a comet due to pass Earth that may be missing its tail bbc.in/3uDlKKw
Neptune isn't as blue as we thought it was #Echobox=1704894743" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">newscientist.com/article/241095…
CALLING COMET OBSERVERS: The marvellous Sarah Watson (working with @ProfChrisScott at Reading) predicts strong activity in the tail of Comet Encke next week. Observations to help Sarah test her model needed. Details here: britastro.org/section_news_i…
