English: Atlas Image of the comet C/1997 J2 (Meunier-Dupouy). A large number of comets have been serendipitously imaged during the routine course of 2MASS. A list of comets in the Second Incremental Data Release can be found here. This comet, "une comète Française," discovered in 1997 May independently by Meunier and Dupouy (also by Jean Mueller, Palomar Observatory), has a relatively large perihelion distance (3.76 AU), and visually reached two maxima, both at about 10.5 visual magnitudes, in 1997 November and, again, in 1998 August, the second when it was at its smallest distance from Earth (2.49 AU). The 2MASS images were made on 1998 October 22, as the comet became more distant and fainter (about 12 visual magnitudes). The apparent coma diameter at that time was about one arcminute. Its spectrum, or component colors, most closely resembles the light it is reflecting, that is, the light of our Sun.