51K
Observer: David McDavid
Location: Limber Observatory, Pipe Creek, Texas
Date: March 13-20, 1997
Here's a panel of 3 polarization images of Hale-Bopp from Limber Observatory. In these images of the inner coma of Comet Hale-Bopp, the brightness is proportional to the linear polarization. North is up, east is left, and the field is about 2.5 arcmin on a side.
Each image was made by combining 3 separate frames taken with a Photometrics CCD camera (Thomson 512 chip) on the 0.4 m telescope at Limber Observatory, using polaroid filters with their transmission axes at position angles of 45, 90, and 135 degrees. The reduction was done with the IRAF task "linpol."
Most of the polarization is due to the scattering of
sunlight by the dust and gas of the comet, so it is useful
for mapping features where the dust and gas are especially
dense.
David McDavid
mcdavid@bongo.limber.org
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