Subscription Center
February 16, 2011 | 5
In 2005 NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft launched an impactor into Comet Tempel 1 in an effort to study its composition. Another spacecraft, Stardust–NExT, caught up with the comet on Monday and from a mere 178 kilometers away captured dozens of images that reveal changes in Tempel 1's surface in the past six years. Between the two visits the comet had completed one trip around the sun.
The montage above includes images collected by Deep Impact [top right] and Stardust–NExT [bottom right]. Scientists think that cliffs, illustrated with yellow lines to the right, are being eroded back to the left in this view. The cliffs appear to have been worn away by as much as 20 to 30 meters in some places since 2005. The box shows depressions that have merged together over time, also as a result of erosion caused by volatile substances evaporating from the comet. The image at top left is a wider shot of Tempel 1 taken by Deep Impact.
See what we're tweeting about
Myrmecos Hard to top this closing line for sheer snark: "when I researched this article regarding Yahoo, I had to Google it."
http://t.co/rv9qtxtgrN
caleb_scharf An Unheralded Breakthrough: The Rosetta Stone of Mathematics | Guest Blog, Scientific American Blog Network http://t.co/zAbDGlynqv @sciam
PsiWavefunction Is anyone already doing that? Esp. when not associated with SciAm blogs, I'm just a private citizen, a colleague even.
Deadline: Aug 31 2013
Reward: $100,000 USD
The Geoffrey Beene Foundation Alzheimer’s Initiative (GBFAI) is launching the 2013 Geoffrey Beene Global NeuroDiscovery Challenge whose
Deadline: Jun 30 2013
Reward: $1,000,000 USD
This is a Reduction-to-Practice Challenge that requires written documentation and&
Powered By: 
YES! Send me a free issue of Scientific American with no obligation to continue the subscription. If I like it, I will be billed for the one-year subscription.
5 Comments
Add CommentThat photo reveals a great deal more than mere EROSION.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.freecommonlaw.us/images/plans/GATempe3.png
You really must have blinders on. :)
If there was that much erosion in only 5 years, it would seem that this is a very short-lived object.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLike our moon, it's manmade.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not sure if I should pity you or not but I certainly think you have been in the sun a bit too long. There is no indication of anything man made outside of the Earth and a few gadgets placed in orbit or local interplanetary bodies in the last 50 years. A photoshopped picture does not constitute evidence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow about a link to that image on the NASA site?
You can Google Tempe1 and it'll come up. I've been re-rendering NASA photos for four years now; and I'm truly and honestly sick and tired of what comes back to me. So, no I am not going to explain it to you anymore than that; and if you have no curiosity about NASA or their lying, then that's how it is.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this