Polarization studies of comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR)

Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad 380009, India

Corresponding author: U. C. Joshi, joshi@prl.ernet.in

Received: 25 June 2002
Accepted: 23 April 2003

Abstract

Linear polarization observations were carried out on comet C/2000 WM1 with the 1.2 m telescope at Mt. Abu Observatory during November 2001 and March 2002. The observations in November were at low phase angle (<) when the polarization is negative and where the data for most of the comets are rather meager. The observations during March were made when the phase angle was ~47°. Observations were conducted through the IHW narrow band and BVR broad band filters. Based on these polarization observations we infer that the comet C/2000 WM1 belongs to high polarization class i.e. the dusty comet family.