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Earth Moon Planet (2008) 102:209219
DOI 10.1007/s11038-007-9162-6
Peter Brown Robert J. Weryk Daniel K. Wong James Jones
Received: 30 June 2007 / Accepted: 25 September 2007 / Published online: 12 October 2007 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2007
Abstract The Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar is a multi-frequency backscatter radar which has been in routine operation since 1999, with an orbit measurement capability since 2002. In total, CMOR has measured over 2 million orbits of meteoroids with masses greater than 10 lg, while recording more than 18 million meteor echoes in total. We have applied a two stage comparative technique for identifying meteor streams in this dataset by making use of clustering in radiants and velocities without employing orbital element comparisons directly. From the large dataset of single station echoes, combined radiant activity maps have been constructed by binning and then stacking each years data per degree of solar longitude. Using the single-station mapping technique described in Jones and Jones (Mon Not R Astron Soc 367:10501056, 2006) we have identied probable streams from these single station observations. Additionally, using individual radiant and velocity data from the multi-station velocity determination routines, we have utilized a wavelet search algorithm in radiant and velocity space to construct a list of probable streams. These two lists were then compared and only streams detected by both techniques, on multiple frequencies and in multiple years were assigned stream status. From this analysis we have identied 45 annual minor and major streams with high reliability.
Keywords Meteor streams Radar Meteoroids
1 Introduction
The recognition of meteor streams as debris from cometary activity stands as one of the seminal discoveries in meteor astronomy over the last two centuries (Burke 1986). Meteor streams trace the present and past activity of their parent bodies and therefore form an important link to understanding the dynamical and physical evolution of comets. Additionally, recognizing associations between streams and asteroids (the Geminids and 3200
P. Brown (&) R. J. Weryk D. K. Wong J. Jones
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada N6A 3K7 e-mail: [email protected]
The Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar Meteor Stream Catalogue
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Phaethon, the Quadrantids and 2003 EH1 for example) may provide insight into transition objects which straddle...