Science News Desk – Astronomers have discovered a new comet – C/2023 A3 (Suchinshan-Atlas) – which could be next year’s brightest star. However, it is still more than 18 months away from Earth and the Sun. It is being estimated from the articles being written on this comet that how can be its bird’s eye view. People are also discussing a lot on social media about Comet Suchinshan-Atlas. What is the full story of this new comet? Several dozen new comets are discovered each year, most of which cannot be seen without the aid of an instrument. However, at least one comet appears every year that can normally be seen with the naked eye. Comets are celestial bodies whose central part is solid and the outer part is made of refrigerated gases like ammonia, methane and water vapor etc.
A comet is also called a comet, but it is not a star. Comets orbit the Sun in very large elliptical orbits and remain away from the Sun for most of their orbital periods. However, occasionally a very bright comet is visible. Since comets are short-lived and of ephemeral beauty, their discovery is always exciting, and the Tsuchinshan-Atlas proves to be perfect on this scale. Discovered independently by astronomers at the Purple Mountain Observatory and the Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Final Alert System (ATLAS) in China, the comet is currently a billion kilometers from Earth between the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn. The comet is moving inward and moving into an orbit that will bring it within 59 million kilometers of the Sun in September 2024.
Part of the reason for the enthusiasm of astronomers is that it has been possible to find out about Tsuchinshan-Atlas at such a time when it is so far away. This comet is bright even though it is far away from the Sun. When comets come close to the Sun, they heat up and the ice on their surface melts and turns into gas. Rising from the surface of the comet, this gas carries a cloud of dust with it, which becomes a huge cloud of gas and dust and its center is surrounded by a huge cloud of gas and dust called ‘coma’ . The ‘coma’ is then pushed away from the Sun by the solar wind, resulting in the formation of a vertical tail indicating its distance from the Sun. The closer a comet is to the Sun, the hotter its surface and the more active it is.
Historically, the brightest, most spectacular comets have followed orbits that bring them closer to the Sun than Earth’s orbit, and Tsuchinshan-Atlas certainly lives up to the notion that the closer, the better. Suchinshan-atlas proves to be better than other methods as it is larger in atomic size which makes it more luminous. It will definitely come very close to our star. After this it will pass almost directly between the Earth and the Sun. The closer a comet is to Earth, the brighter it appears to us. It is expected that this comet may be the brightest star. According to some predictions, it could be up to 100 times more luminous.