Determining the ages of comets from the fraction of crystalline dust

Joseph A. Nuth (), Hugh G. M. Hill and Gunther Kletetschka
Additional contact information
Joseph A. Nuth: Code 691
Hugh G. M. Hill: Code 691
Gunther Kletetschka: Code 691

Nature, 2000, vol. 406, issue 6793, 275-276

Abstract: Abstract The timescale for the accretion of bodies in the disk surrounding a young star depends upon a number of assumptions, but there are few observational constraints. In our own Solar System, measurements of meteoritic components can provide information about the inner regions of the nebula, but not the outer parts. Observations of the evolution of more massive protostellar systems (Herbig Ae/Be stars) imply that significant changes occur in the physical properties of their dust with time1. The simplest explanation is that thermal annealing of the original, amorphous grains in the hot inner nebula slowly increases the fractional abundance of crystalline material over time. Crystalline dust is then transported outward, where it is incorporated into comets that serve as a long-term reservoir for dust disks, such as that surrounding Beta Pictoris. Here we show that when applied to our own Solar System, this process can explain observed variations in both the volatile and dusty components of comets, while also providing a natural indicator of a comet's mean formation age. Studies of comets with different dust contents can therefore be used to investigate the timescales of the early Solar System.

Date: 2000
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/35018516 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:406:y:2000:i:6793:d:10.1038_35018516

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/35018516

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().