MIRAC2/IRTF Images of Comet Hyakutake at 11.7 microns


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March 20, 21 and 25 UT from left to right


The above images are mosaics of observations taken at the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) on March 20 - 25, 1996 with MIRAC2 using a 10% bandwidth 11.7 micron filter. North is up and East to the left, and the images are 64 arcsec on a side. Exposure times were 2, 0.4, and 0.5 sec on March 20, 21, and 25, respectively. The images were taken by Casey Lisse, Mike A'Hearn, and Aditya Dayal (with operators D. Griep and C. Kaminski), in collaboration with the rest of the UMD Comet Group (including A'Hearn, Lisse, Yanga Fernandez, and Laura Woodney) and the MIRAC2 team.

MIRAC2 was built and is operated by the University of Arizona and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. The camera utilizes a Rockwell HF-16 128x128 hybrid Si:As BIB array. MIRAC2 team members are William Hoffmann (UA), Giovanni Fazio (SAO), Lynne Deutsch (BU), Joseph Hora (SAO) and Aditya Dayal (UA).


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More MIRAC2 Images and profiles of Comet Hyakutake at several wavelengths