Abstract
Even if comets may not be guilty of mass extinctions, they have certainly been the subject of some hypotheses of varying degrees of weirdness. Among twentieth century researchers into comets and associated phenomena, the name S.K. Vsekhsvyatskii looms large. His analysis of the changing brightness of comets as they approach and recede from the Sun enabled him to estimate an average rate of response to the changing degree of solar radiation which is still widely used in making brightness forecasts for these objects, even though more recent alternative values are increasingly taking over from what had long been considered as Vsekhsvyatskiiâs standard. Nevertheless, his research into the way comets respond to their distance from the Sun resulted in one of the most comprehensive descriptive catalogues of historical comets available until recent years, published in his book Physical Characteristics of Comets and later supplements, which has proved invaluable both to researchers of comets and to historians of astronomy.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
Âİ 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Seargent, D. (2016). Comet Controversies. In: Weird Astronomical Theories of the Solar System and Beyond. Astronomers' Universe. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-25295-7_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-25295-7_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-25293-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-25295-7
eBook Packages: Physics and AstronomyPhysics and Astronomy (R0)