Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) with curved tail.

[Taman]

Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) taken on Sunday night with poor seeing. 

Currently about magnitude 10.4, it's predicted to brighten to around magnitude 0 on 12th Oct making it a very bright naked eye comet. Stellarium shows that it will track high in the sky during October, so hopefully we have a good chance to get some spectacular images of it. Let's hope it survives its close encounter with the Sun!

The tail is well developed and has an interesting curve, does anyone know what's causing this?

40 x 60s, C11 at f6.3, ASI294MC Pro.

Clear skies!

Tony.

[scotty1]

Basic answer

Sunlight exerts radiation pressure on the dust tail. It seems to align back towards the comet's curved orbit. 

 

 

Edited June 4 by scotty1

[Taman]

6 hours ago, scotty1 said:

Sunlight exerts radiation pressure on the dust tail. It seems to align back towards the comet's curved orbit. 

Thanks for the explanation, I'd not seen that effect before with any of my previous images of comets.

[scotty1]

I was not sure myself, i presumed it was debris trailing backwards along the comet's orbit. I hadn't read about the sunlight radiation pressure. I can't verify if the info is correct 🤔, as with a lot of info we are fed via media and take for granted...☄️

Edited June 5 by scotty1

[Tiny Clanger]

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200722.html is simply explained. https://www.wired.com/2013/03/why-is-a-comets-tail-curved/ includes some mathematical modelling .

 

[Taman]

9 hours ago, Tiny Clanger said:

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200722.html is simply explained. https://www.wired.com/2013/03/why-is-a-comets-tail-curved/ includes some mathematical modelling .

Thanks for the links, that was a cracking APOD! hope we see something similar with this comet. The Wired.com article explains it well, comets are not as simple as they look!