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(meteorobs) Re: Imaging comet tails?
Thanks for making that important point, Brian... So for a straight tail, the
reflectivity, average size and particle density really are NOT the limiting
factors for imageable tail length. Rather, geometry is!
Of course, in the case of dust tails, there actually is curvature - and in
fact, that curved dust tail is the REAL reason for my question... :) Another
interesting thread arose on 'meteorobs' this past week, when several people
mentioned second-hand reports from Draconid, Leonid, and Bielid meteor storms
in the past, where observers had noted a faint glow visible to the naked eye
around the radiant both during and PRIOR TO the storm event.
One possible explanation for this (though not the only one of course), is that this glow is actually reflected sunlight from the storm component (or particle "subband") within the meteoroid stream! The question arose whether it might be possible to image this glow, and in fact even to do so with more sensitive detectors in sub-storm situations where no naked eye glow was visible!
Similar threads (of potential interest to MPLIST readers) have arisen in the past, when even seemingly wild ideas like measuring the reddening of stellar light from intervening meteoroid streams were suggested! (Clearly, such ideas are beyond the scope of this discussion... :>)
However capturing faint glows is probably a *primary* interest of many MP readers - especially comet dust tails, but probably also the zodiacal light, Gegenschein, maybe even lunar Lagrange dust clouds! So with that in mind, I naively put the question out to the list: Is it conceivable to directly image the reflected sunlight from a meteoroid stream? If so, what are the limits of distance, density, particle size, phase angle, etc. for this?
Clear skies!
Lew Gramer
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