During its journey toward Jupiter’s icy moons, ESA’s #JUICE spacecraft used its onboard #instruments to analyze the trajectory and composition of the interstellar #comet 3I/ATLAS, a few days after it passed close to the #Sun.
It was thus revealed that Comet 3I/ATLAS was releasing some 2,000 kg of water per second into space, that this water vapor came mainly from grains of #icy dust making up its #coma, ...
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that the gas and dust forming the comet’s tail extended over more than 5 million kilometers; that this comet has two tails: one moving away from the #Sun while the other follows the path taken by the comet through the solar system.
In conclusion: Comet 3I/ATLAS, although of interstellar origin, behaves similarly to comets in our Solar System. And the instruments on board the #Juice probe are working perfectly! 👏 👍️ 😃
IRAP