En route to destruction: the evolution in composition of ices in comet D/2012 S1 (ISON) between 1.2 and 0.34 AU from the sun as revealed at infrared wavelengths

Abstract

We report production rates for H2O and eight trace molecules (CO, C_2H_6, CH_4, CH_3OH, NH_3, H_2CO, HCN, C_2H_2) in the dynamically new, Sun-grazing Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON), using high-resolution spectroscopy at Keck II and the NASA IRTF on 10 pre-perihelion dates encompassing heliocentric distances R_h = 1.21–0.34 AU. Measured water production rates spanned two orders of magnitude, consistent with a long-term heliocentric power law Q(H_2O) ∝ R_h^(-3.1±0.1). Abundance ratios for CO, C_2H_6, and CH_4 with respect to H_2O remained constant with R_h and below their corresponding mean values measured among a dominant sample of Oort Cloud comets. CH_3OH was also depleted for R_h > 0.5 AU, but was closer to its mean value for R_h ≤ 0.5 AU. The remaining four molecules exhibited higher abundance ratios within 0.5 AU: for R_h > 0.8 AU, NH_3 and C_2H_2 were consistent with their mean values while H_2CO and HCN were depleted. For R_h < 0.5 AU, all four were enriched, with NH_3, H_2CO, and HCN increasing most. Spatial profiles of gas emission in ISON consistently peaked sunward of the dust continuum, which was asymmetric antisunward and remained singly peaked for all observations. NH_3 within 0.5 AU showed a broad spatial distribution, possibly indicating its release in the coma provided that optical depth effects were unimportant. The column abundance ratio NH_2/H_2O at 0.83 AU was close to the "typical" NH/OH from optical wavelengths, but was higher within 0.5 AU. Establishing its production rate and testing its parentage (e.g., NH_3) require modeling of coma outflow.

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