Scientists from UCLA have made an exciting discovery that’s heading toward our part of the cosmos from the oldest, outermost part of the solar system: the largest comet astronomers have ever seen.
According to their observations and calculations, Jewitt and his team believe Comet C/2014 UN271 is between 80 and 85 miles across.This diagram compares the size of the icy, solid nucleus of comet C/2014 UN271 to several other comets.
Jewitt, alongside Man-To Hui, lead author of the new study who earned his UCLA Ph.D. under Jewitt in 2019, isn't the first to find this particular comet in the night sky. Astronomers Pedro Bernardinelli and Gary Bernstein discovered C/2014 UN271 while combing through images taken in 2014.The comet caught Bernardinelli and Bernstein's attention, and later that of Jewitt and Hui, because it was so visible from a point so far from Earth.
Comet C/2014 UN271's origin in the Oort Cloud is"not unique in that regard, but it is unusual to see comets active that far out," he said. That's because when objects as small as the typical comet are that far away, they don't reflect enough light for our telescopes to pick them up."You can’t see anything in the Oort cloud,” Jewitt explained.
That theory turned out to be correct. And its brightness was all the more impressive, Jewitt said, because the comet is so dark overall. "I would just guess that it’s carbon monoxide, because we do see that in other comets," he explained.
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