C/2007 W3 LINEAR
more info
Comet C/2007 W3 was discovered on 29 November 2007 with Lincoln Laboratory Near-Earth Asteroid Research project; that is about 6 months before its perihelion passage. It was observed until 8 September 2008.
Comet had its closest approach to the Earth on 27 June 2008 (1.576 au), about 3.5 weeks after its perihelion passage.
Solutions given here are based on data spanning over 0.775 yr in a range of heliocentric distances: 2.89 au – 1.777 au (perihelion) – 2.17 au, and the non-gravitational acceleration is well-detectable in its motion during the period covered by positional observations (about nine months).
This Oort spike comet suffers moderate planetary perturbations during its passage through the planetary system and these perturbations lead to a more tight future orbit (see future barycentric orbit).
See also Królikowska and Dybczyński 2013 and Królikowska 2020.

solution description
number of observations 208
data interval 2007 11 29 – 2008 09 08
data type significantly more measurements before perihelion (PRE+)
data arc selection entire data set (STD)
range of heliocentric distances 2.89 au – 1.78 au (perihelion) – 2.17 au
type of model of motion NS - non-gravitational orbits for standard g(r)
data weighting YES
number of residuals 413
RMS [arcseconds] 0.52
orbit quality class 1b
orbital elements (heliocentric ecliptic J2000)
Epoch 2008 05 14
perihelion date 2008 06 02.79723997 ± 0.00026167
perihelion distance [au] 1.77661017 ± 0.00000537
eccentricity 1.00011031 ± 0.00001251
argument of perihelion [°] 112.626585 ± 0.000223
ascending node [°] 73.068696 ± 0.000079
inclination [°] 78.673567 ± 0.000045
reciprocal semi-major axis [10-6 au-1] -62.09 ± 7.04
Time distribution of positional observations with corresponding heliocentric (red curve) and geocentric (green curve) distance at which they were taken. The horizontal dotted line shows the perihelion distance for a given comet whereas vertical dotted line — the moment of perihelion passage.
non-gravitational parameters
A1 [10-8au/day2] 4.9695 ± 0.5718
A2 [10-8au/day2] 2.2535 ± 0.5805
A3 [10-8au/day2] -1.0834 ± 0.3162
m -2.15
n 5.093
k -4.6142
r0 [au] 2.808
α 0.1113