[meteorite-list] First Map of Rosetta's Comet

[Ron Baalke]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-308

First Map of Rosetta's Comet
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
September 11, 2014

Scientists have found that the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko 
-- the target of study for the European Space Agency's Rosetta mission 
-- can be divided into several regions, each characterized by different 
classes of features. High-resolution images of the comet reveal a unique, 
multifaceted world.

ESA's Rosetta spacecraft arrived at its destination about a month ago 
and is currently accompanying the comet as it progresses on its route 
toward the inner solar system. Scientists have analyzed images of the 
comet's surface taken by OSIRIS, Rosetta's scientific imaging system, 
and defined several different regions, each of which has a distinctive 
physical appearance. This analysis provides the basis for a detailed scientific 
description of 67P's surface. A map showing the comet's various regions 
is available at:

http://go.nasa.gov/1pU26L2

"Never before have we seen a cometary surface in such detail," says OSIRIS 
Principal Investigator Holger Sierks from the Max Planck Institute for 
Solar System Science (MPS) in Germany. In some of the images, one pixel 
corresponds to a scale of 30 inches (75 centimeters) on the nucleus. "It 
is a historic moment -- we have an unprecedented resolution to map a comet," 
he says.

The comet has areas dominated by cliffs, depressions, craters, boulders 
and even parallel grooves. While some of these areas appear to be quiet, 
others seem to be shaped by the comet's activity, in which grains emitted 
from below the surface fall back to the ground in the nearby area.

"This first map is, of course, only the beginning of our work," says Sierks. 
"At this point, nobody truly understands how the surface variations we 
are currently witnessing came to be."

As both comet 67P and Rosetta travel closer to the sun during the next 
few months, the OSIRIS team and other instruments on the payload will 
monitor the surface to look for changes. While scientists do not expect 
the borderlines they have identified for the comet's different regions 
to vary dramatically, even subtle transformations of the surface may help 
to explain how cometary activity created such a breathtaking world.

The new comet maps will offer valuable insights for members of the Rosetta 
team, who plan to gather in Toulouse, France, on September 13 and 14, 
to determine a primary and backup landing site from five candidates they 
previously had selected.

The scientific imaging system, OSIRIS, was built by a consortium led by 
the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (Germany) in collaboration 
with Center of Studies and Activities for Space, University of Padua (Italy), 
the Astrophysical Laboratory of Marseille (France), the Institute of Astrophysics 
of Andalusia, CSIC (Spain), the Scientific Support Office of the European 
Space Agency (Netherlands), the National Institute for Aerospace Technology 
(Spain), the Technical University of Madrid (Spain), the Department of 
Physics and Astronomy of Uppsala University (Sweden) and the Institute 
of Computer and Network Engineering of the TU Braunschweig (Germany). 
OSIRIS was financially supported by the national funding agencies of Germany 
(DLR), France (CNES), Italy (ASI), Spain, and Sweden and the ESA Technical 
Directorate.

Rosetta is an ESA mission with contributions from its member states and 
NASA. Rosetta's Philae lander is provided by a consortium led by DLR, 
MPS, CNES and ASI. Rosetta will be the first mission in history to rendezvous 
with a comet, escort it as it orbits the sun, and deploy a lander to its 
surface.

For more information on the U.S. instruments aboard Rosetta, visit:

http://rosetta.jpl.nasa.gov

More information about Rosetta is available at:

http://www.esa.int/rosetta

DC Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-9011
agle at jpl.nasa.gov

2014-308