Hubble Witnesses Asteroid Coming Unglued
This Hubble Space Telescope image reveals the gradual self-destruction of an asteroid, whose ejected dusty material has formed two long, thin, comet-like tails. The longer tail stretches more than 500,000 miles (800,000 kilometers) and is roughly 3,000 miles (4,800 kilometers) wide. The shorter tail is about a quarter as long. The streamers will eventually disperse into space.
These unusual, transient features are evidence that the asteroid, known as (6478) Gault, is beginning to come apart by gently puffing off material in two separate episodes. Hubble's sharp view reveals that the tails are narrow streamers, suggesting that the dust was released in short bursts, lasting anywhere from a few hours to a few days.
The first tail was spotted on Jan. 5, 2019; the second in mid-January. An analysis of both tails suggests the two dust releases occurred around Oct. 28 and Dec. 30, 2018.
Astronomers think the tiny asteroid, only 2.5 miles wide, is disintegrating due to the long-term subtle effects of sunlight, which can slowly speed up its spin until it begins to shed material. In fact, the self-destruction may have been started more than 100 million years ago. Pressure from sunlight very slowly began spinning up the diminutive asteroid at an estimated rate of 1 second every 10,000 years.
The asteroid is located 214 million miles from the Sun, between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
Credits
NASA, ESA, K. Meech and J. Kleyna (University of Hawaii), and O. Hainaut (European Southern Observatory)| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Asteroid (6478) Gault |
| Object Description | Asteroid |
| Distance | At the time of the Hubble observations in February 2019, Asteroid Gault was 1.5 astronomical units (139 million miles) from Earth and 2.4 astronomical units (223 million miles) from the Sun. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The image was created from Hubble data from proposal (K. Meech) |
| Instrument | WFC3/UVIS |
| Exposure Dates | 05 Feb 2019 |
| Filters | F350LP |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | These images are a composite of separate exposures acquired by the WFC3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. The color results from assigning the color blue to a monochromatic (grayscale) image. |
| Compass Image |  |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
