NASA really wants you to know that 3I/ATLAS is an interstellar comet

Imaging suggests that a lot of the material coming off is in the form of dust grains. NASA indicated that two missions to asteroids, Lucy and Psyche, were especially helpful here, since they were farther from the Sun than 3I/ATLAS, and so could capture backlit images of the comet’s coma.

NASA’s Tom Statler, the lead scientist for Solar System bodies, said that the amount of material being released by 3I/ATLAS is fairly typical of Solar System comets. But some of the details…