Overview
- Tianwen-1’s newly released Mars-orbit images from early October capture a clear nucleus and large coma thousands of kilometers across, with no obvious tail noted by China’s space agency.
- ESA’s CaSSIS camera on the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter likewise recorded a bright, slightly fuzzy coma during the Mars flyby without a visible tail in those frames.
- A Nov. 5 observation by Qicheng Zhang at Lowell Observatory shows a green glow from diatomic carbon, with the dust tail likely foreshortened by a near head‑on viewing geometry.
- Post‑perihelion tracking indicates a small non‑gravitational acceleration and measurable mass loss, updating dynamics flagged by JPL after the Oct. 29–30 Sun passage.
- Spectra point to an unusually CO2‑rich coma and a surface likely altered by long cosmic‑ray exposure, with coordinated campaigns and JWST observations expected to probe the mechanisms as a safe Dec. 19 Earth flyby approaches.