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comet
[ kom-it ]
noun
- a celestial body moving about the sun, usually in a highly eccentric orbit, consisting of a central mass surrounded by an envelope of dust and gas that may form a tail that streams away from the sun.
comet
/ ˈkɒmɪt; kɒˈmɛtɪk /
noun
- a celestial body that travels around the sun, usually in a highly elliptical orbit: thought to consist of a solid frozen nucleus part of which vaporizes on approaching the sun to form a gaseous luminous coma and a long luminous tail
comet
- A celestial object that orbits the Sun along an elongated path. A comet that is not near the Sun consists only of a nucleus—a solid core of frozen water, frozen gases, and dust. When a comet comes close to the Sun, its nucleus heats up and releases a gaseous coma that surrounds the nucleus. A comet forms a tail when solar heat or wind forces dust or gas off its coma, with the tail always streaming away from the Sun.
- ◆ Short-period comets have orbital periods of less than 200 years and come from the region known as the Kuiper belt. Long-period comets have periods greater than 200 years and come from the Oort cloud.
- See more at Kuiper beltSee Note at solar system
comet
- An object that enters the inner solar system , typically in a very elongated orbit around the sun . Material is boiled off from the comet by the heat of the sun, so that a characteristic tail is formed. The path of a comet can be in the form of an ellipse or a hyperbola . If it follows a hyperbolic path, it enters the solar system once and then leaves forever. If its path is an ellipse, it stays in orbit around the sun.
Notes
Derived Forms
- ˈdzٲ, adjective
Other Word Forms
- dz··· [kom, -i-ter-ee], ·· [k, uh, -, met, -ik], ·i· adjective
- dzij· adjective
Word History and Origins
Origin of comet1
Word History and Origins
Origin of comet1
Example Sentences
Meteor showers happen when dust from a passing comet or asteroid passes through the Earth's atmosphere.
The name “meteor shower” might also incorrectly imply that what viewers are seeing are meteors themselves, or the leftover comet particles and bits from broken asteroids, instead of the trail left behind them.
Reality does not instill the same confidence one sees in sci-fi depictions of scenarios in which near-Earth objects like asteroids and comets approach our planet.
Messier was interested in comets, so his list was a set of fuzzy objects that might be mistaken for comets.
After Trump left office, films like A24’s “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and Netflix’s comet satire “Don’t Look Up” explored themes of large-scale destruction and what it takes to stop it.
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