Astronomers at Northern Arizona University announced the discovery of activity on space object Centaur 2014 OG392. This asteroid belongs to the centaurs - a group of small celestial bodies rotating between Jupiter and Neptune in elongated orbits and having comet features, for example, a coma and a tail. On the results of a study published in The Astrophysical Journal, briefly describes in a press release on Phys.org.
Centaur 2014 OG392 is too far from the Sun for the water ice to sublimate and turn into a cloud of gas that surrounds the cometary nucleus. However, astronomers have recorded signs of a weak coma, which stretches 400 thousand kilometers from the surface of the centaur. The observations were carried out using a DEC camera mounted on a telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (Chile). The DEC (Dark Energy Camera) camera is one of the most sensitive astronomical instruments and is designed to clarify the expansion rate of the universe, but it is also used to study faint objects, including those in the solar system.
Researchers suspect that cometary activity is caused by the sublimation of either carbon dioxide, ammonia, or a mixture of these substances. The celestial body in optical rays looks red, but the chemical that gives this color remains unknown. The object itself will be reclassified as a comet and will receive a new designation C / 2014 OG392 (PANSTARRS).
Since 1927, only 18 active centaurs have been discovered, but they are still poorly understood. Identifying centaurs' activity is challenging as they are very dim and rare.
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