Well, there's more to it than just what I attempted to outline above, and I'm not sure my terminology is entirely correct; it's likely an oversimplification. I know the speed at which inbound comets approach perihelion has bearing on the matter, but it's definitely not the sole factor. It's also important to distinguish between comets' ion tails and dust tails, which are under the influence of separate forces.

From here:

Animation, from here:

Returning to the WHATZIT. The very first one seen differs from the normal "hot" pixel in that it looks tilted. The others exhibit spill over to adjacent pixels as the pixels are read out horizontally. The tilt is along the axis of the instrument's diffraction spike. (you can see the diffraction spike in the bright object (star or planet visible the past few days) near the coronograph post in the lower left of the latest image here:
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/...26_1118_c3.gif )

Thus, this WHATZIT looks a lot more like a real bright OBJECT than a cosmic ray hit hot pixel. I claim that a cosmic ray atomic particle would NOT have a diffraction spike and be tilted like the WHATZIT.

John: just out of curiosity, was it you who submitted this query on the Yahoo SOHO Comethunters' Group referencing the animation on page one? Just wondering, since the language there appears quite similar to your posts on this thread.

In their opinion, it's a pair of CR hits. Should Dr SOHO be consulted rather than engaging in another page of unnecessary speculation?

At the April APS Astrophysics conference there was a guy who claimed that the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet was made of anti-matter which caused the bigger than expected explosions on Jupiter. In fact he thinks most comets are anti-matter so when Deep Impact hits it'll really cause a big explosion. Maybe that's what the "Whatzit" flash is. Transitory one time events like these are hard to explain. He also believes that when comets hit the sun they cause CMEs for this reason. He was pooh-poohed a lot.

Many, if not all, of the comets that Lou Frank sees hitting earth may be just cosmic rays hitting his instrument; but gamma ray bursts could indeed be antimatter hitting matter. We know such things occur above the galactic plane because we see the signature of electron-positron anihilation. Gamma ray bursts could be due to higher order antimatter like atoms or molecules hitting matter.

John, I certainly don't mean to seem confrontational, but I'm at a total loss to understand why you're refusing to answer my questions. Your profile indicates that you've been participating here long enough to know that evasive maneuvers are frowned upon. Are my questions so unreasonable?

Wolverine. I wonder what the whatzit is. I have no agenda.

I don't think there is any easy way to discriminate between a pixel being overloaded by a cosmic ray particle or a bright short duration object like a flash of light due to an explosion or a rotating mirror-like surface from something like a glossy volcano or smooth ice field. I think good scientists like Lou Frank can be fooled because there is almost no way to tell the difference.
One possible way is to look for diffraction spikes which it seems the whatzit exhibits. This is more like a bright flash of light than a cosmic ray. I am unsatisfied with the cosmic ray explanation.

If it's a CR it must be very energetic, but energetic CRs are so rare that it seems unlikely. If the coronagraph can be used as a cosmic ray detector, then there should be some very interesting cosmic ray science to be done here, correlating direct hit CRs with CMEs, timing of CRs, magnitude of CRs versus flare size, etc. Calibration of LASCO instruments in accelerators with beams hitting at various angles and energies and particle charges might be useful in this, but it may be hard to generate individual particles in an accelerator beam.
Head-on collisions of cosmic ray particles into a pixel must be pretty energetic. They probably do not come directly from the sun because the coronagraph is in the way, so they must be deflected slightly, but only slightly, by interplanetary magnetic fields. I doubt they are secondaries from the coronagraph but who knows?

If the whatzit is an explosion, then several possibilities arise. Maybe it is brightening suddenly as a non-volatile object undergoes a sudden phase change. Such explanations have been made for comets like Kohoutek with anomalous brightening curves. Maybe it indeed is a matter anti-matter interaction. Or maybe it is just something near the instrument caught passing by for a short duration.

You seem to think I am avoiding your question as to what I think it is. I truly don't know what it is.

Nowhere did I allege that you had an agenda, despite having avoided a number of questions. Of the more important, though, you're refusing to describe what analyses you are performing and what resources/tools (if any) you're using to evaluate what's in the images you posted.

I am neither professing to be skilled in image analysis, nor anything but an interested rank amateur who enjoys reviewing the various imagery and data provided by SOHO instrumentation. Having seen people obsess over completely prosaic things in the LASCO imagery around the web for some time, I'm consistently baffled by the propensity to engage in "maybes" and "what ifs" when opportunity exists to consult the experts themselves. That being said, and at the risk of sounding like a broken record:

If you are unsatisfied with the CR explanation, why won't you ask them for assistance? :-s

But you know what it isn't??

...another thing I noticed...

You seem to have come to the conclusion that if you can demonstrate that it's not a hot pixel, the only other explanaton is that it has to be some kind of "object".

Please explain how
you arrived at that conclusion...

__________________
"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

I hope I didn't say that it isn't a hot pixel or that it is an object. But I'm definitely leaning that way. I am unsatisfied with the hot pixel explanation, especially for a tilted object that seems to have diffraction spikes. Look at the object near the post in this image. It is tilted along the diffraction spike just like the whatzit (except it's along the normal one compared to the whatzit, but diffraction spikes generally make an X). This is definitely an object that is seen in all the previous images, but now is tilted. It is either a bright star or a planet. I doubt a hot pixel would tilt.
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/...27_0242_c3.gif

I suppose the tilt of the above object could be due to an internal reflection off the occulting disk post, but that is somewhat unlikely.


I don't use "tools" other than some experience with ccd images.

For the last time, John, please answer my most recent question if nothing else.

The bright object in the lower-left portion of the frame is Antares.

Another fast moving whatzit here in chronological order:
http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/data/rea...17_1342_c3.gif

http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/data/rea...17_1418_c3.gif

http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/data/rea...17_1442_c3.gif

The last image is fainter at the top center.

Note the comet at two o'clock. Nice. It appears on several images.

Could this or something like it have been a whatzit? Coming from the direction of the sun.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...se_041222.html

Whitley Strieber thinks these could be real objects. I rather doubt it. Not like the other Whatzits which seemed to appear in a couple frames.
http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=4354

What I love about these "objects" is the way that they instinctively align themselves with the FPA on SOHO.