Comet ISON
This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image of Comet (C/2012 S1) ISON was photographed on April 10, 2013, when the comet was just within Jupiter's orbit, at a distance of 386 million miles from the Sun (394 million miles from Earth). Even at that great distance the comet is already active as sunlight warms the surface and causes frozen volatiles to sublimate. ISON stands for International Scientific Optical Network, a group of observatories in ten countries who have organised to detect, monitor, and track objects in space. ISON is managed by the Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics, part of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
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Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: /2012, 2013, 21st, astronomical, astronomy, body, celestial, century, comet, deep, heavenly, hst, hubble, image, ison, nevski-novichonok, object, phenomena, phenomenon, s1, science, sky, space, sungrazing, telescope
