Exoplanets, -moons, -comets

An Overview Of Exocomets

By Keith Cowing
Status Report
astro-ph.SR
November 13, 2025
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An Overview Of Exocomets
The distribution of planets, main comet and asteroid belts around the Sun, and the equivalent analogues for Beta Pictoris and WD 1145+017. All distances are logarithmic, scaled such that they all have the same equilibrium temperature for a blackbody, meaning that the various sublimation lines are at the same x-axis locations for comparison. Distances from each star are labelled in stellar radii (upper scale) and astronomical units (lower scale). For the Sun, Solar system comets are shown with notable associated distances, belts and planets. For β Pictoris, the planets and main belts are noted. For the white dwarf WD 1145+017 the locations for the six transiting bodies are indicated, with a zoomed-in panel showing their labelled order from Vanderburg et al. (2015). — astro-ph.EP

We give a general overview of what the scientific community refers to as “exocomets”.

The general definition of exocomets, as presented in this work, is discussed and compared with Solar System comets and interstellar objects, addressing their detection around main-sequence stars as well as orbiting white dwarfs.

We introduce the different types of exocomet observations, highlighting the difference between exocometary ‘bodies’ and exocometary ‘material’. We provide a census of all exocometary system candidates detected so far, both via spectroscopy and photometry, including detections around white dwarfs.

Daniela Iglesias, Isabel Rebollido, Azib Norazman, Colin Snodgrass, Darryl Z. Seligman, Siyi Xu, H. Jens Hoeijmakers, Matthew Kenworthy, Alain Lecavelier des Etangs, Michele Bannister, Bin Yang

Comments: 49 pages, 2 figures, 3 tables. Accepted to Space Science Reviews
Subjects: Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP); Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR)
Cite as: arXiv:2511.08270 [astro-ph.EP] (or arXiv:2511.08270v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2511.08270
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Submission history
From: Daniela Iglesias Dr
[v1] Tue, 11 Nov 2025 14:00:57 UTC (1,295 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.08270
Astrobiology,

Keith Cowing

Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Station Payload manager/space biologist, Away Teams, Journalist, Lapsed climber, Synaesthete, Na’Vi-Jedi-Freman-Buddhist-mix, ASL, Devon Island and Everest Base Camp veteran, (he/him) 🖖🏻

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