C/2020 T2 (Palomar) is a non-periodic comet with an approximately 5,530-year orbital period around the Sun. It was discovered from the Palomar Observatory on 7 October 2020.
Observational history The comet was first identified by D. A. Duev when he analyzed the photographic plates taken by the Palomar Observatory on 7 October 2020, where he spotted a tail stretching about 5 arcseconds in length.
Its large perihelion distance of has enabled numerous follow-up observations to be conducted until 2022. On 10 January 2021, the comet was from Earth, and around magnitude 16.4 in brightness. Between 22 January and 5 July 2021, extensive observations from the Purple Mountain Observatory detected traces of hydrogen cyanide (HCN) gas continuously emanating from its coma. On 17 May 2021, the comet was located as a 10.5-magnitude object with an outer green coma measuring 10-arcminutes in size near the Messier 3 globular cluster. Around two weeks before perihelion, observations of the comet noted that it lacked a significant dust tail, but there was a strong condensation on its coma, reminiscent of a typical Manx comet, where near-infrared spectropolarimetry measurements of the comet were also conducted in the same time period. Post-perihelion observations from the Hissar Observatory between 27 August and 2 September 2021 revealed that the upper estimate of the size of its nucleus is roughly km in diameter. By October 2021, the comet faded back to an 11th-magnitude object as it moved away from both the Sun and the Earth.
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