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Amateur Astronomers and the Recovery of Periodic Comets

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2016

Patrick Martinez*
Affiliation:
10 rue Alphonse-Daudet, F-31200 Toulouse, France

Abstract

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Most periodic comets are recovered by professional astronomers at faint magnitudes (18–21). Only Tsutomu Seki, using a 60-cm telescope has been an exception to this rule. Amateurs having access to large telescopes (such as the T 60 at Pic du Midi) now stand a chance of success. For example, using the T 60, the author photographed P/Halley at mag. 19–20 on forming-gas hypered Kodak TP2415 in a 1-hour exposure. Experiments by C. Buil suggest that the same telescope can reach magnitudes 21–22 with a CCD array cooled to – 50° C and a 30-minute integration time.

Type
Part III Observations and Results
Copyright
Copyright © Springer-Verlag 1988

References

Martinez, P.: “Première détection européene amateur de la comète de Halley”, L’Astronomie, 1985 June, p. 281 Google Scholar
Martinez, P.: “L’utilisation du T 60 pour la redécouverte des comètes périodiques”, L’Astronomie, 1987 May, p. 247 Google Scholar
Merlin, J.C.: “La redécouverte des comètes périodiques” in Astronomie — le Guide de ľ Observateur, Paris, 1987, pp. 417-20Google Scholar