A green comet!

[Joanne98]

Throughout much of February, true early birds can catch a comet.

Comet Lulin — formally C/2007 N3 (Lulin) — is gracing the skies in the way-wee hours of the morning. It’s still not clear if it will be visible to the naked eye later this month. But at the least, it should be a sweet binocular sight.

And catch it while you can. It won’t be back for a million years. For a series of recent telescope-based images, you’ll find a nice photo gallery here.

As its formal title implies, the comet was discovered in 2007. NASA’s Tony Phillips has a nice little summary of the story behind the comet’s discovery here.

Its green hue comes from the gases it’s giving off as it approaches the sun and its ices begin to sublimate — change immediately from solid to gas. Two in particular — cyanogen and bound pairs of carbon atoms known as diatomic carbon — give the comet’s fuzzy halo, or coma, and its tail the green cast.

http://features.csmonitor.com/discoveries/2009/02/05/look-for-comet-lulin-it-wont-be-back-for-a-million-years/

Pictures

http://spaceweather.com/comets/gallery_lulin.htm