Comparison of neutral outgassing of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko inbound and outbound beyond 3 AU from ROSINA/DFMS

A nearly terrestrial D/H for comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Cometary comae are a mixture of gas and ice-covered dust. Processing on the surface and in the coma change the composition of ice on dust grains relative to that of the nucleus. As the ice on dust grains sublimates, the local coma composition changes. Rosetta observations of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko previously reported one of the highest D/H values for a comet. However, reanalysis of more than 4000 water isotope measurements over the full mission shows that dust markedly increases local D/H. The isotope ratio measured at a distance from the nucleus where the gas is well mixed is close to terrestrial, like that of other Jupiter family comets. This lower D/H has implications for understanding comet formation and the role of comets in delivering water to Earth.

Glycine amino acid transformation under impacts by small solar system bodies, simulated via high-pressure torsion method

Impacts by small solar system bodies (meteoroids, asteroids, comets and transitional objects) are characterized by a combination of energy dynamics and chemical modification on both terrestrial and small solar system bodies. In this context, the discovery of glycine amino acid in meteorites and comets has led to a hypothesis that impacts by astronomical bodies could contribute to delivery and polymerization of amino acids in the early Earth to generate proteins as essential molecules for life. Besides the possibility of abiotic polymerization of glycine, its decomposition by impacts could generate reactive groups to form other essential organic biomolecules. In this study, the high-pressure torsion (HPT) method, as a new platform for simulation of impacts by small solar system bodies, was applied to glycine. In comparison with high-pressure shock experiments, the HPT method simultaneously introduces high pressure and deformation strain. It was found that glycine was not polymerized in the experimental condition assayed, but partially decomposed to ethanol under pressures of 1 and 6 GPa and shear strains of < 120 m/m. The detection of ethanol implies the inherent availability of remaining nitrogen-containing groups, which can incorporate to the formation of other organic molecules at the impact site. In addition, this finding highlights a possibility of the origin of ethanol previously detected in comets.

General Fitting Methods Based on Lq Norms and their Optimization

The widely used fitting method of least squares is neither unique nor does it provide the most accurate results. Other fitting methods exist which differ on the metric norm can be used for expressing the total deviations between the given data and the fitted statistical model. The least square method is based on the Euclidean norm L2, while the alternative least absolute deviations method is based on the Taxicab norm, L1. In general, there is an infinite number of fitting methods based on metric spaces induced by Lq norms. The most accurate, and thus optimal method, is the one with the (i) highest sensitivity, given by the curvature at the minimum of total deviations, (ii) the smallest errors of the fitting parameters, (iii) best goodness of fitting. The first two cases concern fitting methods where the given curve functions or datasets do not have any errors, while the third case deals with fitting methods where the given data are assigned with errors.