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Incredible New Gif Shows Cosmic 'Snow' On the Surface of a Comet (gizmodo.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the winter-wonderland dept.

Press2ToContinue shares a report from Gizmodo: What you're looking at is the surface of the comet 67p/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which is orbited by the European Space Agency's Rosetta probe. The photo comes from Rosetta's OSIRIS, or Optical, Spectroscopic, and Infrared Remote Imaging System. The raw data was collected on June 1, 2016, and posted publicly on March 22 of this year. Twitter user landru79 processed the gif from this data release and shared it yesterday. In the foreground is the comet's surface (still several kilometers away from the probe), and three kinds of specks. The stars in the background belong to the constellation Canis Major, according to ESA senior advisor Mark McCaughrean. Some of the foreground stuff could be streaks from high-energy particles striking the cameraâ"it's a charge-coupled device (CCD), so even invisible particles can leave streaks in the results. And some could be dust from the comet itself.

4 of 89 comments (clear)

  1. New Gif? by ls671 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    New Gif?

    Who cares about the image format in such a context?

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    Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    1. Re:New Gif? by Joce640k · · Score: 4, Insightful

      New Gif?

      Who cares about the image format in such a context?

      The only thing GIF is used for these days is animations on the web, so... yes it's useful information.

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    2. Re:New Gif? by caparra · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Nowadays gif means 'short animation', much more than a particular format. Slashdot seems to be full of cranky Statlers and Waldorfs this days.

    3. Re:New Gif? by king+neckbeard · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Slashdot IS an asshole environment.

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