7
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Comet Bernardinelli-Bernstein; could it be a "planet-killer" and what could prevent it from getting close to us?
Objects in space follow the laws of gravity. Since the sun is by far the biggest object in the solar system, nearly all objects (except moons) are in elliptical orbits around the sun.
There are ...
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6
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Accepted
How is a comet visible when far from the Sun
We can see it because it refects the light of the sun. It doesn't reflect much light (most comets are dark grey to black on their surface), but as you mention, it is exceptionally large (for a comet)....
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2
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Comet Bernardinelli-Bernstein; could it be a "planet-killer" and what could prevent it from getting close to us?
This image from the Wikipedia entry will probably explain it best. It's closest approach to the Sun is simply due to the properties of its orbit, just like all of the planets.
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What exactly did ALMA observe at 20 AU from the "Mega Comet Arriving From the Oort Cloud" that will pass in 2031?
ALMA measured the brightness of thermal emission from the comet (at 1287 µm or 233 GHz). The comet was not resolved directly, so Lellouch++2022 treated it as a point source. But spatial information in ...
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