DART撞击所造成的扩张烟尘
2022年10月5日
Expanding Plume from DART’s Impact
Video Credit: Les Makes Observatory, J. Berthier, F. Vachier, A. Klotz, P. Thierry, T. Santana-Ros, ESA NEOCC, D. Föhring, E. Petrescu, M. Micheli
Explanation: What happens if you crash a spaceship into an asteroid? In the case of NASA’s DART spaceship and the small asteroid Dimorphos, as happened last week, you get quite a plume. The goal of the planned impact was planetary protection — to show that the path of an asteroid can be slightly altered, so that, if done right, a big space rock will miss the Earth. The high brightness of the plume, though, was unexpected by many, and what it means remains a topic of research. One possibility is that 170-meter wide Dimorphos is primarily a rubble pile asteroid and the collision dispersed some of the rubble in the pile. The featured time-lapse video covers about 20 minutes and was taken from the Les Makes Observatory on France’s Reunion Island, off the southeast coast of southern Africa. One of many Earth-based observatories following the impact, the initial dot is primarily Dimorphos’s larger companion: asteroid Didymos. Most recently, images show that the Didymos – Dimorphos system has developed comet-like tails.
DART Impact on Dimorphos: Notable images submitted to APOD
Tomorrow’s picture: open space
影片提供: Les Makes Observatory, J. Berthier, F. Vachier, A. Klotz, P. Thierry, T. Santana-Ros, ESA NEOCC, D. Föhring, E. Petrescu, M. Micheli
说明: 如果把宇宙飞船撞进小行星会发生什么事？此范例所呈现的主角，是NASA的DART宇宙飞船和小行星双卫一，而其结果为一团很壮观的烟尘。这次规划撞击的目标是行星防护，用以证明撞击小行星能让它的路径稍微改变，所以如果处理得当的话，能让太空巨岩错过地球。然而，所造成的烟尘之亮度，却远高于预期，而这意味着它会成为研究的课题。可能的解释之一为：170公里宽的双卫一为砾石堆小行星，碰撞使堆中的部分砾石飞散。这部摄于非洲南部东南海岸外海的法国留尼汪岛Les Makes天文台之缩时主题影片，所涵盖的期间约为20分钟。Les Makes天文台是追踪这例撞击的多个地表天文台之一，而其所记录的影片开头的初始亮斑，大部分的光是来自双卫一较大的伙伴双生星。最近的影像显示，双生星-双卫一系统已发展出彗星状的尾巴。
DART对双卫一的影响: 提交给APOD的重要图像
明日的图片: open space