Comet

Cosma / Communication / Knowledge / Realm / Physical / Universe / Solar System / Small Body / Comet
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comet : a celestial body that appears as a fuzzy head usually surrounding a bright nucleus, that has a usually highly eccentric orbit, that consists primarily of ice and dust, and that often develops one or more long tails when near the sun — Merriam-Webster See also OneLook

Encyclopedia

Comet is a icy small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to evolve gasses, a process called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena are due to the effects of solar radiation and the solar wind acting upon the nucleus of the comet. Comet nuclei range from a few hundred metres to tens of kilometres across and are composed of loose collections of ice, dust, and small rocky particles. The coma may be up to 15 times the Earth’s diameter, while the tail may stretch one astronomical unit. If sufficiently bright, a comet may be seen from the Earth without the aid of a telescope and may subtend an arc of 30° (60 Moons) across the sky. Comets have been observed and recorded since ancient times by many cultures. — Wikipedia

Comet (Encyclopædia Britannica)

Comet (COSMOS: The SAO Encyclopedia of Astronomy)

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Inspiration

NASA’s Eyes is a freely available suite of computer visualization applications created by the Visualization Technology Applications and Development Team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to render scientifically accurate views of the planets studied by JPL missions and the spacecraft used in that study. Eyes on Astroids provides real-time visualization of every known asteroid or coment that is classified as a Near-Earth Object (NEO). You can also explore most of NASA’s asteroid and comet missions (past and present), from Galileo , to Lucy and DART.– Wikipedia

Eyes on Asteroids (NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System, NASA’s JPL & Cal Tech)

Halley’s Comet (NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System, NASA’s JPL & Cal Tech)
Comet 9P/Tempel 1 (NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System, NASA’s JPL & Cal Tech)
Comet 67P/ Churyumov-Gerasimenko (NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System, NASA’s JPL & Cal Tech)
Comet Hartley 2 (NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System, NASA’s JPL & Cal Tech)

Comets (Astrum, YouTube Playlist)

Articles about Comets (Big Think)

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Innovation

Science

Solar System Exploration: Comets (NASA Science)
Asteroids, Comets & Meteors (NASA Science)
Small Bodies of the Solar System (NASA Science)

Comet Videos (ViewSpace, Space Telescope Science Institute)

Object Search (International Astronomical Union)

Comets (Mike Brown’s Planets)

Comets (Eric Weisstein’s World of Astronomy, Wolfram Research)
Comets (Wolfram Alpha)

Commerce

Entrepreneurship

Comets Campaigns (Kickstarter)

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Preservation

History

Cometographia (Objectivity, YouTube Video)
The Comet Hunter (Objectivity, YouTube Video)

Comet History (Encyclopædia Britannica)
Comets (World History Encyclopedia)

Library

DDC: 523.6 Comets (Library Thing)
Subject: Comets (Library Thing)

Subject: Comets (Open Library)

LCC: QB 717 Comets (UPenn Online Books)

LCC: QB 717 Comets (Library of Congress)
Subject: Comets (Library of Congress)

Subject: Comets (WorldCat)

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Participation

Education

Comets – Level 1 (StarChild, Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA)
Comets – Level 2 (StarChild, Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA)

Comets (Cosmos4Kids)
Comets (Space Scoop)

Asteroids, Comets, and Meteorites (Lunar & Planetary Institute)
Asteroids and Comets (Science Trek)

Comets (Crash Course Astronomy, YouTube Video)

MERLOT: Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching
OER Commons: Open Educational Resources

Community

Organization

Minor Planet Center (International Astronomical Union)
Comet Section (British Astronomical Association)

News

Comets (Minor Planet Center, International Astronomical Union)
Comets (Nova Research Highlights, American Astronomical Society)
Comets (EurekaAlert, AAAS)
Comets (JSTOR)
Comets (Astronomy Magazine)
Comets (Phys.org)

Recent News from Phys.org …

12 billion years old, this interstellar comet is...
on June 28, 2026 at 6:00 pm
One year ago, on July 1, 2025, astronomers discovered a fascinating new object moving through the solar system. Detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS), the object was quickly recognized as something special.
Ancient stellar flyby may still be steering...
on June 25, 2026 at 11:40 pm
The Gaia mission has allowed researchers to understand the motions of stars like never before, even revealing possible interactions between our solar system and nearby stars. Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Nathan Kaib and collaborator Sean Raymond (Universite de Bordeaux) have found that a recent stellar passage likely triggered a huge increase in comet formation as the star's gravity altered Oort cloud objects' orbits, sending them cascading into the inner solar system. We may […]
Happy Asteroid Day! Prize-winning plan focuses on...
on June 23, 2026 at 5:40 pm
For decades, astronomers and policymakers have been working on plans to protect our planet from killer asteroids. But now there's a new realm to protect: the thousands of satellites we're putting in orbit.
How solar wind forecasting will help define...
on June 22, 2026 at 10:10 pm
Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) scientists are using a solar wind forecasting method combined with analytic and numerical heliosphere models to find out where the first plasma boundary of the outer heliosphere lies as NASA's New Horizons spacecraft hurtles toward this mysterious region of space.
Third known interstellar visitor 3I/ATLAS may be...
on June 22, 2026 at 3:37 pm
An interstellar comet that blazed past the sun last year could be nearly three times older than our solar system and is unlike anything ever seen before in our cosmic backyard, astronomers said Monday.