Swan Xingming Comet

Comet discovered by Sun Guoyou and Xin Xin in 2015

On April 11, 2015 Beijing time, International Astronomical Union The Asteroid Center, the website of the Center for Astrophysics of Harvard University, announced an exciting news for Chinese amateur astronomers. The Center announced that amateur astronomers from Xingmingwen Taiwan Sun Guoyou and happy The new comet discovered was named C/2015 F5 (SWAN-XINGMING) Comet Swan Xingming.^[1]

Chinese name: Swan Xingming Comet
Foreign name: C/2015 F5 (SWAN-XINGMING)
Alias: Comet Xingming
Classification: comet
Discoverer: Sun Guoyou 、 happy
Discovery time: April 5, 2014

Apparent magnitude: 11 etc
Right ascension: 23:27:58.07
Declination: +11°48′08.5″
Semimajor axis: fifteen
Eccentricity: one
Rail inclination: 148.88448 degrees

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Discovery process

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Swan Xingming Comet

At 3:00 am today (April 11, 2015), International Astronomical Union Announcement, by Star Tomorrow Wentai The new comet C/2015 F5 (SWAN-XINGMING) discovered by Sun Guoyou and Gao Xin, two amateur astronomers, was officially named Swan Xingming Comet This is the fifth comet discovered by amateur astronomers in mainland China and the third comet discovered by Xingmingtai. It has been six years since the last discovery of a new comet. On the evening of April 4, 2015, I finished my observation lunar eclipse Later, the planned comet search (XOSS-CSP) was continued by using the remote control observatory (Xingtomongwen) in the Nanshan Mountains of Urumqi. More than 7 a.m. on the 5th, Sun Guoyou Tonghao from Wenzhou called to report that a comet like target was found in the picture just taken by Xingtomongwen, and the comet features were obvious. We immediately carried out the measurement and suspicious target confirmation, because the discovery of comets is a very important and urgent matter. We divided our work. Yuan Shihong was responsible for the measurement, and other colleagues who participated in the Star Tomorrow Wentai Sky Survey Plan helped to verify whether it was a new target and draft the report text. I will send the report to the competent experts of the International Astronomical Union after 8 o'clock. Because the comet was found at a very low altitude, and the measurement was also difficult, the experts also asked us after receiving the report and asked us to provide more information. Sun Guoyou also checked the satellite photos released by the US satellite SWAN detector a few days ago and found a suspicious correspondence among them, and told the experts.

Due to the time difference, the experts did not make the corresponding announcement in time. Considering the particularity of the comet, Xu Wentao, a member of the XOSS team, asked the Polish scout hunter to use the remote control observatory in Chile to help verify and confirm it. Unfortunately, the horizon height of the comet before sunrise was unusually low, so it was very difficult to shoot it successfully, Guo Zhengqiang, a member of the XOSS team, in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, considered that the weather in Northeast China could be photographed and verified. He drove to the observation site nearly 100 kilometers away to help verify at 2:00 a.m. on the 6th. As the weather was bad on the morning of the 6th, I also arranged for forced photography. At 7:00 a.m. on the 6th, Sun Guoyou used the latest pictures of Guo Zhengqiang and Xingmingmingmingwen to find the corresponding comet, The survey was carried out and reported again. After 9 o'clock, experts from the International Astronomical Union sent a reply saying that our findings had been published on the official NEOCP (NEO waiting for confirmation page) and PCCP (comet waiting for confirmation page)^[2] Waiting for more professional and amateur observatories around the world to confirm the supplementary observation data.

Different from the first two comets found by Xingmingwen Observatory, this comet is very difficult to search. Many observatories are basically difficult to verify under extreme conditions. Moreover, the comet orbit determination data is also affected by the low altitude atmosphere difference, and the error is relatively large. From the 6th to the 11th, there were observation data from France, Russia, Italy, Austria, etc, The final reported data reached more than 80 observation time points.

According to the comet naming rules, if there are more than one person and more than one observation site finding and reporting before the official announcement, the discovery naming right will be shared. If there are more than two people, they will be named after the observation site or the team organization. Therefore, the discovery comet dominated by Wentai tomorrow will be named Swan Xingming Comet.

It is very difficult to search and find comets, especially under the competition of numerous automated telescopes in major systems around the world, especially in the northern hemisphere, it is almost impossible to find comets without team cooperation. I would like to thank all my colleagues who participated in the Xingtomorrow Wentai XOSS program. Without their hard work, we could not have found so many comets, The name of this comet is also the best memory of the famous amateur astronomer Zhou Xingming who passed away in 2004. It is his personality charm and perseverance that inspire us to dare to challenge, continue to work hard and forge ahead.^[3]