COMET C/2008 C1 (CHEN-GAO)This comet has been discovered by Tao Chen (Suzhou City, Jiangsu province,
China) on a CCD image taken on Feb. 1 by Xing Gao (Urumqi, Xinjiang
province) with a wide-field 7-cm, 200-mm-f.l., f/2.8 camera lens (+
Canon 350D camera) at Gao's Xingming Observatory
The first observatory to confirm it was J87 La Cañada. Because the initial astrometry was not very precise (discovered with a wide field camera) the firsts stacks showed a quite elongated nucleus, making me think the comet was breaking in pieces, after stacking on the correct movement the nucleus was perfectly round though. The pictures , 20 arc min on each side, show the comet as a fuzzy spot in the upper left area.
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Below is a false colour rendition of the isophotes map showing an elongated comma in position angle 35 degrees. (detail 2x).
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False color rendition of the comma (2x).
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(c) Juan Lacruz, 2008 Feb 02, 19:10 UT
All the images have north up and east to the left.
LX200R 0.40m F10 + STL1001E CCD
Scale 1.2 arc sec per pixel.
Stack of 9 images 3 min each.
Outer comma 50 arc sec diameter, inner condensation 20 arc secs dia., PA 35 deg .
References : IAUC 8915 (only subscribers..), MPEC 2008-C16