Rosetta comet has odd boulders
ESA’S ROSETTA SPACECRAFT has revealed fascinating boulder-like structures covering the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. One boulder in particular stands out due to its similarity to an Egyptian pyramid – so it has been named Cheops after the largest pyramid within the Giza Necropolis.
The strange feature is up to 45m wide and casts a long shadow across the comet’s surface. “The surface of Cheops seems to be very craggy and irregular,” says Rosetta scientist Holger Sierks from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany. His team hopes that as Rosetta continues to circle the comet, it will be able to tell them more about the composition of the boulders and how they might have formed.