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      Dust of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko collected by Rosetta/MIDAS: classification and extension to the nanometre scale

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          Abstract

          The properties of the smallest subunits of cometary dust contain information on their origin and clues to the formation of planetesimals and planets. Compared to IDPs or particles collected during the Stardust mission, dust collected in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko during the Rosetta mission provides a resource of minimally altered material with known origin whose structural properties can be used to further the investigation of our early Solar System. A novel method is presented to achieve the highest spatial resolution of imaging possible with the MIDAS Atomic Force Microscope on-board Rosetta. 3D topographic images with resolutions of down to 8\,nm are analysed to determine the subunit sizes of particles on the nanometre scale. Three morphological classes can be determined, namely (i) fragile agglomerate particles of sizes larger than about 10\,\(\mathrm{\mu m}\) comprised by micrometre-sized subunits that may be again aggregates and show a moderate packing density on the surface of the particles; (ii) a fragile agglomerate with a size about few tens of micrometres comprised by micrometre-sized subunits suggested to be again aggregates and arranged in a structure with a fractal dimension less than two; (iii) small, micrometre-sized particles comprised by subunits in the hundreds of nanometres size range that show surface features suggested to again represent subunits. Their differential size distributions follow a log-normal distribution with means about 100\,nm and standard deviations between 20 and 35\,nm. All micrometre-sized particles are hierarchical dust agglomerates of smaller subunits. The arrangement, appearance and size distribution of the smallest determined surface features are reminiscent of those found in CP IDPs and they represent the smallest directly detected subunits of comet 67P.

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          Identification of molecular-cloud material in interplanetary dust particles

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            Interstellar dust. Evidence for interstellar origin of seven dust particles collected by the Stardust spacecraft.

            Seven particles captured by the Stardust Interstellar Dust Collector and returned to Earth for laboratory analysis have features consistent with an origin in the contemporary interstellar dust stream. More than 50 spacecraft debris particles were also identified. The interstellar dust candidates are readily distinguished from debris impacts on the basis of elemental composition and/or impact trajectory. The seven candidate interstellar particles are diverse in elemental composition, crystal structure, and size. The presence of crystalline grains and multiple iron-bearing phases, including sulfide, in some particles indicates that individual interstellar particles diverge from any one representative model of interstellar dust inferred from astronomical observations and theory. Copyright © 2014, American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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              An improved model for interplanetary dust fluxes in the outer Solar System

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                Author and article information

                Journal
                02 July 2019
                Article
                10.1051/0004-6361/201834851
                1907.01266
                d467af1c-a90f-4baa-a550-539da3c5ee79

                http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/

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                Custom metadata
                astro-ph.EP

                Planetary astrophysics
                Planetary astrophysics

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