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4015 Wilson–Harrington is an active asteroid known both as comet 107P/Wilson–Harrington and as asteroid 4015 Wilson–Harrington. It passed 0.4 AU (60 million km) from Earth on 20 July 2022 and then passed perihelion on 24 August 2022. It seldom gets brighter than apparent magnitude 16. It will return to perihelion on 25 November 2026.
Comet Elst–Pizarro is a body that displays characteristics of both asteroids and comets, and is the prototype of active asteroids. Its orbit keeps it within the asteroid belt, yet it displayed a dust tail like a comet while near perihelion in 1996, 2001, and 2007.
2685 Masursky, provisional designation 1981 JN, is a stony Eunomian asteroid from the central regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 11 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 3 May 1981, by American astronomer Edward Bowell at the Anderson Mesa Station near Flagstaff, Arizona, and named after American planetary geologist Harold Masursky. In January 2000, the Cassini space probe observed the S-type asteroid from afar during its coast to Saturn.
223 Rosa is a large Themistian asteroid. It is classified as a combination of C-type and P-type asteroids, so it is probably composed of carbonaceous material rich in water ice. It was discovered by Johann Palisa on 9 March 1882, in Vienna. The origin of the name is not known.
269 Justitia is a fairly sizeable main belt asteroid around 50 km in diameter.
302 Clarissa is a typical main belt asteroid. The asteroid was discovered by the French astronomer Auguste Charlois on 14 November 1890 in Nice. The origin of the name is unknown. In 1991, 302 Clarissa was being considered as a possible fly-by target for the Cassini spacecraft, but was later removed from consideration.
307 Nike is a sizeable asteroid of the asteroid belt. It was discovered by Auguste Charlois on 5 March 1891 while working at the Nice Observatory. Charlois named it after the Greek goddess of victory, as well as the Greek name for the city where it was discovered. Measurement of the light curve of this asteroid in 2000 indicates a rotation period of 7.902 ± 0.005 hours.
(10302) 1989 ML is an as yet unnamed near-Earth asteroid. It is approximately 0.6 km in diameter. An Amor asteroid, it orbits between Earth and Mars. It is an X-type asteroid, so its surface composition is yet unknown. It was discovered by Eleanor F. Helin and Jeff T. Alu at Palomar Observatory on 29 June 1989.
453 Tea is an S-type asteroid belonging to the Flora family in the Main Belt. Its diameter is about 21 km and it has an albedo of 0.183. Its rotation period is 6.4 hours.
662 Newtonia is a minor planet, specifically an asteroid orbiting mostly in the asteroid belt.
1034 Mozartia, provisional designation 1924 SS, is a stony asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 8 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 7 September 1924, by Soviet Vladimir Albitsky at Simeiz Observatory on the Crimean peninsula, and named after Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
1809 Prometheus is an asteroid from the outer region of the asteroid belt, approximately 14 kilometers in diameter. Discovered during the Palomar–Leiden survey in 1960, it was given the provisional designation 2522 P-L and named after Prometheus from Greek mythology.
9949 Brontosaurus, provisional designation 1990 SK6, is a stony asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, roughly 10 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 22 September 1990, by Belgian astronomer Eric Elst at ESO's La Silla Observatory in northern Chile. It was named after Brontosaurus, a genus of dinosaurs.
24101 Cassini (provisional designation 1999 VA9) is an eccentric background asteroid from the middle region of the asteroid belt, approximately 7 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 9 November 1999, by American amateur astronomer Charles Juels at the Fountain Hills Observatory (678) in Arizona, United States. It was named after Italian–French astronomer Giovanni Cassini.
3361 Orpheus is an Apollo asteroid that was discovered on 24 April 1982 by Carlos Torres at Cerro El Roble Astronomical Station. Its eccentric orbit crosses that of Mars and Earth, and approaches Venus as well. From 1900 to 2100 it passes closer than 30 Gm to Venus, 11; Earth, 33; and Mars, 14 times. It passed by Earth at a distance of about 0.03 AU in 1937, 1978, 1982, and 2021, and will do so again in 2025.
37432 Piszkéstető (provisional designation 2002 AE11) is an Erigonian asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 4.6 kilometers (2.9 miles) in diameter. It was discovered on 11 January 2002, by the Hungarian astronomers Krisztián Sárneczky and Zsuzsanna Heiner at the Konkoly Observatory's Piszkéstető Station northeast of Budapest, Hungary. The asteroid was later named for the discovering observatory.
9524 O'Rourke, provisionally designated 1981 EJ5, is an asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 3 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 2 March 1981, by American astronomer Schelte Bus at the Siding Spring Observatory in New South Wales, Australia. The asteroid was named after Laurence O'Rourke, a researcher at the European Space Astronomy Centre.
52246 Donaldjohanson (provisional designation 1981 EQ5) is a carbonaceous Erigonian asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) in diameter. It was discovered on 2 March 1981, by American astronomer Schelte Bus at the Siding Spring Observatory in Australia. The C-type asteroid is a target of the Lucy mission and was aptly named after American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson, the discoverer of the "Lucy" hominid fossil.
284996 Rosaparks, provisional designation 2010 LD58, is a dark background asteroid from the outer regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 3.5 kilometers (2.2 miles) in diameter. It was discovered on 9 June 2010 by scientists working with data from the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer spacecraft. It is named after Rosa Parks, the African-American civil rights activist.
The MBR Explorer is a planned UAESA space probe designed to journey to seven different main belt asteroids. Proposed under the Emirates Mission to the Asteroid Belt, it is named in recognition of the foundational role driving the creation and growth of the UAE Space Program played by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the vice president and the prime minister of UAE.
References
- ↑ "Chimaera" . Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press.(Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
- ↑ "623 Chimaera (1907 XJ)". JPL Small-Body Database . NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory . Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ↑ "Arabian spacecraft to search asteroid belt for clues to life's origins". ABC News. 30 May 2023. Retrieved 27 March 2024.
- ↑ "Ambitious Emirati Mission Seeks to Visit 7 Asteroids and Land on the Big Red One". Gizmodo. 10 May 2023. Retrieved 27 March 2024.
- ↑ Nasir, Sarwat (29 May 2023). "MBR Explorer: UAE unveils details of its mission to the main asteroid belt". The National. Retrieved 27 March 2024.
