MOST ESSENTIAL

LEARNING COMPETENCY
Compare and contrast
comets, meteors, and
asteroids
Comets
Asteroid
Meteors
 Match It!!!
Directions: Match Column A
with Column B.

1. A. meteor

2. B. comet

3. C. asteroid
 What’s the difference?
COLUMN A COLUMN B
1. Comets A. Large rocky body (≥ few hundred
meters in diameter) that orbits the
Sun

2. Asteroids B. small rocky body (< few hundred

meters) in orbit around the Sun

3. Meteoroids C. small body of ice and dust in a

highly elliptical orbit around the Sun

ALL ARE PLANETESSIMALS! Left over

from the formation of our solar system
COMET
Comet Diagram

1
3 4
A.Nucleus
B.Ion Tail
C.Dust Tail
D.Coma
• Dust tail is opposite the motion of the comet.
Trail of debris left behind.
• Ion tail is ALWAYS on the opposite side of the
Sun. Solar wind (charged particles, electron and
protons, shot outward from the Sun). The
charged particles excite the gases emitted from
comet and give off light (usually blue).
• Both tails get bigger/brighter the closer they are
to the sun.
– Dust tail because the sun warms the comet,
sublimating the gases and allowing more
debris to fall off.
– Ion tail because more charged particles from
the sun are colliding with increasing gases
given off from the comet.
 • The orbit of comets is highly
Orbit eccentric (elliptical)
• UNLIKE asteroids and
planets, the orbit is not
necessarily on the same plane
as the path planets take around
the Sun.
• Long Period comets orbit Sun
over 200 yrs
- Hale Bopp 2600 yrs.
• Short Period less than 200
- Haley's comet 75 yr.
(2061)
- Comet Encke shortest
orbital period 3.3 yrs.
Comet Hyatuke 1996
 Composition
• Dirty Snowballs
– Mostly rock and ice surrounded by solid H2,
water, CH4, CO, O2, which sublimate (solid to
gas) when approaching the sun.
– Recently found CaCO3(Calcium carbonate)!!!
• Missions:
– Deep impact. Study the nucleus of Comet
Temple 1. Detonation was July 4th, 2005.
– Stardust. Followed comet Wilde 2 and collected
comet dust. Returned to Earth Jan. 15, 2006
• Dust Tails leave a trail of debris. If the Earth
passes through debris we get a meteor shower.
• Surface of
Comet
Temple 1
–Taken
from the
Deep
Impact
Mission
Surface of 67P (ESA Rosetta Mission-2015)
 Artist conception of what comet looks
like as it approaches the Sun
• Surface is covered with jets of gas as they sublimate
(turn from solid to gas) from the warmth of the Sun.
• Notice the “floating” rocks. Comets have very little
mass, compared to a planet, and therefore have very
little gravity.
 Meteors
“Shooting stars”
• Dust-like comet fragments that enter our
atmosphere at high speeds. 10 to 50
mps (up 180,000 mph)!
• They leave a brief flash called a train in
the upper atmosphere. (caused by gases
becoming charged in our atmosphere)
• Usually the size of sand or less.
• Fireball- long lasting shooting star (few
seconds). Usually basketball size or
more.
METEOR, METEOROID, METEORITE?

3
Fireball during Leonids
(Mid-November)
Another, cooler looking, Fireball
 Meteorites
• Meteors that make it to the ground.
• KINDS
–Stoney- mostly rock (feldspar) (called
chondrites)
–Iron- metal mix
• Largest ever found
–Hoba meteorite. Over 50 tons.
Largest Ever
 Do humans get hit by meteorites?
• Yup… it’s possible.
• Astronomer Alan Harris has calculated that
your odds of getting hit by a meteorite are
1 in 700,000 (1/700,000).
Hit while
walking
home
from
Hit while school
sitting on
her
couch.
 The Meteor Crater
99% + of projectile is vaporized if they are over 50 tons.

2000 meter crater (roughly 1 mile)

20:1 ratio
50,000 yrs old
 Chicxulub Crater
Yucatan Pennisula • 120 Mile wide
crater formed
from a 6 mile
wide asteroid.
• Marks the end of
the Mesozoic-
Killed 70% of
ALL species
(including
dinosaurs)
• Mostly buried
today.
Approximate size of asteroid that ended the
Mesozoic Era (killed the dinosaur)

Los
Angeles
 Meteor Showers
• Increased count per hour.
– On a normal day you should see 1/hour.
– During a shower, up to 100/hour
• When Earth travels through dust trail left
behind by comet (from dust tail). OR ejecta
from meteor collision on another planet.
• Name after constellation they appear from.
– Perseids- Aug 10-13
– Leonids- Nov. 16-17
– Geminids- Dec. 10-15
 Asteroids
• “Minor Planets”
• Found in 2 belts.
– The Asteroid Belt (1/2-way between Mars &
Jupiter)
– Kuiper Belt: Beyond Neptune… includes
Pluto, Xena & Sedna. A few billion miles to
10’s of billions of miles.
• Mostly orbit on same plane as planets
Surface of Asteroid
Itokawa
 Oort Cloud
• Beyond Kuiper belt. Home to trillions
of icy/rock objects up 5 trillion miles
away (almost a lightyear).
• Cannot see these objects yet, but it
is believed there could be objects as
big as the Earth.
• We see 10 or so comets a year
originating from the Oort cloud.
 6 reasons to study asteroids and comets and comets:
1. Asteroids can serve as pit stops – and provide
resources – for future space exploration.
2. Some asteroids or comets may be hazards to
Earth.
3. Asteroids and comets may have delivered the
elements of life to Earth.
4. Essentially, asteroids were the building blocks of
planets.
5. Asteroids and comets help astronomers trace
solar system evolution.
6. Asteroids and comets help astronomers
understand processes in an evolving solar system
Additional Activity:
Construct an informative
letter addressed to your best
friend about the importance
of studying comets, asteroids,
and meteors using your own
dialect as medium.
Rubrics:
Content 10
Organization 10
Medium 10