The Main Belt Comets and Ice in the Solar System
Colin Snodgrass, Jessica Agarwal, Michael Combi, Alan, Fitzsimmons, Aurelie Guilbert-Lepoutre, Henry H. Hsieh, Man-To Hui, and Emmanuel Jehin, Michael S. P. Kelley, Matthew M. Knight and, Cyrielle Opitom, Roberto Orosei, Miguel de Val-Borro, Bin Yang
TL;DR
This paper reviews evidence for buried ice in the asteroid belt, focusing on Main Belt Comets, their water content, detection methods, and future research directions to understand their origins and ice survival.
Contribution
It provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge on MBCs, summarizing observational, modeling, and detection techniques, and discusses future challenges in direct water detection.
Findings
Evidence suggests water exists in the asteroid belt.
Various detection methods have been developed for water in MBCs.
Future research will focus on direct water detection techniques.
Abstract
We review the evidence for buried ice in the asteroid belt; specifically the questions around the so-called Main Belt Comets (MBCs). We summarise the evidence for water throughout the Solar System, and describe the various methods for detecting it, including remote sensing from ultraviolet to radio wavelengths. We review progress in the first decade of study of MBCs, including observations, modelling of ice survival, and discussion on their origins. We then look at which methods will likely be most effective for further progress, including the key challenge of direct detection of (escaping) water in these bodies.
Peer Reviews
No public reviews on file for this paper yet. If you reviewed it on a platform where reviews are public (OpenReview, ICLR, NeurIPS, ICML), you can paste yours below so the community can read it here.
Videos
No videos yet. Explain this paper in a talk, walkthrough, or lecture? Add one.