section_path: Classification/Sungrazing comets
section_name: Sungrazing comets
paragraph_text: Sungrazing comets
  
  A sungrazing comet is a comet that passes extremely close to the Sun at perihelion, generally within a few million kilometers. Although small sungrazers can be completely evaporated during such a close approach to the Sun, larger sungrazers can survive many perihelion passages. However, the strong tidal forces they experience often lead to their fragmentation.
  
  About 90% of the sungrazers observed with SOHO are members of the Kreutz group, which all originate from one giant comet that broke up into many smaller comets during its first passage through the inner Solar System. The remainder contains some sporadic sungrazers, but four other related groups of comets have been identified among them: the Kracht, Kracht 2a, Marsden, and Meyer groups. The Marsden and Kracht groups both appear to be related to Comet 96P/Machholz, which is the parent of two meteor streams, the Quadrantids and the Arietids.