Iona Allen

High school (ages 12+)
Space & Astronomy

Name:

Date:

Step 1 · Read the article

Open the article and read it at the level above. Then answer the questions below in your own words.

https://smallwhale.org/articles/iona-allen

Write what each word means, using the article.

Do not copy the article. Write two things you learned, the way you would explain them to a friend.

Answers below are taken from the article’s stored facts, so they match what the student read.

1. What is the related fields?Planetary Science, Astrophysics, Astrobiology, Solar Physics
2. Why does Iona Allen have a glowing tail?When the comet gets close to the Sun, its icy parts melt and create a cloud of gas called a coma. Solar wind and light push on this gas and dust, forming bright ion and dust tails.
3. Where does Iona Allen come from?Iona Allen comes from far outside the planets, either from the Oort Cloud, a big spherical shell of ice, or from the Kuiper Belt, a disk-shaped region beyond Neptune.

Sublimation: The process where a solid changes directly into a gas without becoming a liquid first.
Perihelion: The point in an object's orbit where it is closest to the Sun.
Isotopic Ratios: The relative amounts of different isotopes of an element, used to trace origins and processes.