By scanning a large area of the sky with the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) telescope, a team led by Quanzhi Ye from the University of Maryland (USA) examined a path of space debris known to regularly pass near Earth: a Taurid swarm. The results of this research are the introduction During the 56th Annual Meeting of Planetary Scientists, held this week in Boise, Idaho, USA.
Astronomers are interested in the Taurid shower because it may contain large samples several hundred meters long that can come close to Earth. But until now it is not clear how many there are.
Observations by Quanzhi Ye and her team now show that the Taurid shower contains a maximum of ten to fifteen asteroids of this caliber, a smaller number than feared. From this, the researchers conclude that the body from which the Taurids emerged could not have been much larger than about ten kilometers. Previous estimates were a maximum of one hundred kilometers.
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According to me, the Taurus showers contain important clues about the evolution of our solar system, especially regarding comets. Incwhich has one of the shortest orbital periods of any known comet (3.3 years) and is unusually large and dusty for such a short-period comet. All things considered, scholars hypothesize that Enki has fractured significantly in the past and will fall apart even more in the future.
“Studying bull showers helps us understand how small objects such as comets and asteroids form and disintegrate over time,” Yi said.
While the study results are reassuring regarding the number of potentially dangerous asteroids in the Taurid swarm, Ye and her team believe they also underscore the need for advanced detection capabilities. With the help of modern observing facilities such as the ZTF telescope, which can be used to conduct large sky surveys, researchers want to conduct follow-up observations of the Taurid swarm in the coming years.
