EPOXI

Two intriguing investigations -- One flight-proven spacecraft

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103P on 2010-09-20

Image of 103P/Hartley taken 2010.09.20 by DI S/C and marked with directional pointers.

Caption: This EPOXI mission image of comet 103P/Hartley 2 was taken 45 days from Encounter (E-45d) using the Medium Resolution Instrument (MRI) and a clear filter. Science Team member Dr. Dennis Wellnitz combined seven successive one-minute exposures to make this single image. The mid-exposure time was 2010/09/20 03:29:33 UTC.

The comet was 1.18 AU from the Sun and 0.31 AU (46 million km) from the spacecraft. The Sun is straight "down" from the comet and celestial north is to the lower right.

[NOTE: This week we had a different person do the post-processing of the combined stacked image. The 'min' set point and 'range' affect the on-screen appearance so it is done uniquely for each image. Later on, as we have more images, we will likely go back and re-do the post-processing on some of these early images using a more universal set of 'min' and 'range' values.]

Technical Details

Image Parameter	Details
Spacecraft:	Deep Impact Flyby
Instrument:	Medium Resolution Instrument (MRI)
Mid-exposure Date/Time (UTC):	2010/09/20 03:29:33
Filter:	Clear
Exposure:	7 x 60 sec
Pointing:	RA 21^h 05' 41" Dec +36° 41' 00"
Field of View:	approximately 235,000 km at the comet
Solar Elongation:	121°
Solar Phase Angle:	46°
Sun-Comet distance (r):	1.1812 AU (177 million km)
DIF-Comet distance:	0.3072 AU (46 million km)

Table 1: Data about image.

Additional Images:

Image of 103P/Hartley taken 2010.09.20 by DI S/C.

Click for full size image.
This is the same image as above, but without the pointers.

Negative image of 103P/Hartley taken 2010.09.20 by DI S/C.

Click for full size image.
Negative of the same image which makes it a little easier to see the faint coma around the comet.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UMD

103P spectra, lightcurves...

2010-10-27 CN coma
2010-10-27 jets, lightcurve
2010-10-21 lightcurve
2010-10-16 spectrum

103P on...

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