Abstract: | Surface temperature and the available effective energy strongly influence the mass flux of H2O and minor volatiles from the nucleus. We perform computer simulations to model the gas flux from volatile, icy components
in porous ice-dust surfaces, in order to better understand results from observations of comets. Our model assumes a porous
body containing dust, one major ice component (H2O) and up to eight minor components of higher volatility (e.g. CO, CH4, CH3OH, HCN, C2H2, H2S), The body's porous structure is modeled as a bundle of tubes with a given tortuosity and an initially constant pore diameter.
Heat is conducted by the matrix and carried by the vapors. The model includes radially inward and outward flowing vapor within
the body, escape of outward flowing gas from the body, complete depletion of less volatile ices in outer layers, and recondensation
of vapor in deeper, cooler layers. From the calculations we obtain temperature profiles and changes in relative chemical abundances,
porosity and pore size distribution as a function of depth, and the gas flux into the interior and into the atmosphere for
each of the volatiles at various positions of the body in its orbit.
In this paper we relate the observed relative molecular abundances in the coma of Comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) and of Comet
46P/Wirtanen to molecular fluxes at the surface calculated from our model.
This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date. |