New results from Philae lander offer first close-up of a comet
Ice and dust inside, 67P’s surface marked by mix of sand, hard rock, craters and cliffs
During its brief time awake on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the Philae lander documented a diverse world. New analyses of lander data reveal the comet as uniform on the inside, but full of variety on the outside. Pebbles, boulders, cliffs and pits blanket the forbidding landscape. Complex organic molecules float above a surface that is as soft as sand in some places and as hard as rock in others.
Not too shabby for a lander that bounced, tumbled, bounced again, fell in a hole and landed on its side. For nearly 60 hours, Philae learned all it could about its new home before running out of power and slipping into a seven-month slumber from which it only recently awoke. The specifics of Philae’s rough landing along with a first look at data from last year appear in seven papers online July 30 in Science.