CAOSP abstracts, Volume: 22, year: 1992
- Author(s): KRESAK, L.;
- Journal: Contributions of the Astronomical Observatory Skalnate Pleso,
vol. 22, p. 123-130.
- Date: 07/1992
- Title: On the ejection and dispersion velocities of meteor particles
- Keyword(s): COMETS, METEORS
- Pages: 123 -- 130
Abstract:
This paper is a reaction to the attempts to determine the ejection
velocities of meteor particles from cometary nuclei using the statistics of
photographic meteor orbits. It is argued that this is essentially impossible.
The original dispersion velocities are masked completely by much larger
measuring errors, and for all permanent meteor showers also by the accumulated
effects of planetary perturbations. The perturbations, appearing after
sufficient spread particles along the orbit, are on the average about 25-times
more effective in the direction perpendicular to the orbital plane than in the
direction of motion, and they are about 50-times more effective for typical
comets of Jupiter family than for those of Halley type. The latter
disproportion is responsible for the widely different distribution of the
revolution periods of comets, annual meteor showers, and temporary meteor
storms. In addition to direct spacecraft measurements, the only feasible
sources of information on the ejection velocities are meteor storms, like the
Draconids or Leonids, appearing only several times per century, and the
cometary dust trail discovered by IRAS. Both of them indicate incomparably
lower velocities than the meteor data - only a few meters per second - and a
substantial role of the solar radiation pressure in the initial dispersion.
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