The Minor Planet Center (MPC) is the official body for observing and reporting on minor planets under the auspices of the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Founded in 1947, it operates at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.
Francesco Manca is an Italian amateur astronomer and discoverer of minor planets at the Sormano Astronomical Observatory in northern Italy.
157P/Tritton is a periodic comet with a 6 year orbital period. Fragment B was first observed on 21 August 2021. Fragment B should come to perihelion in 2028 March and the primary fragment should come to perihelion in 2029 May.
Comet Crommelin, also known as Comet Pons-Coggia-Winnecke-Forbes, is a periodic comet with an orbital period of almost 28 years. It fits the classical definition of a Halley-type comet with. It is named after the British astronomer Andrew C. D. Crommelin who calculated its orbit in 1930. It is one of only four comets not named after their discoverer(s), the other three being Comets Halley, Encke, and Lexell. It next comes to perihelion in late May/early June 2039.
45P/Honda–Mrkos–Pajdušáková is a short-period comet discovered by Minoru Honda December 3, 1948. It is named after Minoru Honda, Antonín Mrkos, and Ľudmila Pajdušáková. The object revolves around the Sun on an elliptical orbit with a period of 5.25 years. The nucleus is 1.3 kilometers in diameter. On August 19 and 20, 2011, it became the fifteenth comet detected by ground radar telescope.
Comet C/2010 X1 (Elenin) is an Oort cloud comet discovered by Russian amateur astronomer Leonid Elenin on December 10, 2010, through remote control of the International Scientific Optical Network's robotic observatory near Mayhill in the U.S. state of New Mexico. The discovery was made using the automated asteroids discovery program CoLiTec. At the time of discovery, the comet had an apparent magnitude of 19.5, making it about 150,000 times fainter than can be seen with the naked eye. The discoverer, Leonid Elenin, originally estimated that the comet nucleus was 3–4 km in diameter, but more recent estimates place the pre-breakup size of the comet at 2 km. Comet Elenin started disintegrating in August 2011, and as of mid-October 2011 was not visible even using large ground-based telescopes.
255P/Levy, formerly P/2006 T1 and P/2011 Y1, is a periodic comet with an orbital period of 5.25 years. It last came to perihelion on 14 January 2012. During the 2006 passage the comet achieved an apparent magnitude of ~9.5. Levy (PK06T010) was believed to have been recovered on 3 June 2011 at magnitude 19.8, but other observatories were unable to confirm a recovery. It was most likely a false positive because of large residuals. Levy was recovered on 17 December 2011 at magnitude 19.8, and given the second designation 2011 Y1. It was then numbered.
P/2011 NO1 (Elenin) is a periodic comet with a preliminary orbital period estimated at 13 ± 0.16 years. It came to perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) around 20 January 2011 at 1.2 AU from the Sun. The orbit is preliminary as it has only been observed over an observation-arc of 22 days. The comet was discovered on 7 July 2011 when the comet was 2.38 AU from the Sun and 1.4 AU from the Earth. It came to opposition 178.6° from the Sun on 22 July 2011 in the constellation Sagittarius.
Leonid Vladimirovich Elenin is a Russian amateur astronomer working with the ISON-NM observatory (H15) via the International Scientific Optical Network (ISON), which is the first Russian remote observatory in the West.
163P/NEAT is a periodic comet discovered on November 5, 2004 by Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) using the 1.2 meter Samuel Oschin telescope at Palomar Observatory.
(432949) 2012 HH2 is a resonant trans-Neptunian object, approximately 255 kilometers (160 miles) in diameter, located in the outermost region of the Solar System. It was discovered by Slovak astronomer Tomáš Vorobjov from images taken on the night of 19 April 2012, at the Astronomical Research Institute (H21) in Illinois, United States. This minor planet was numbered (432949) by the Minor Planet Center on 4 April 2015 (M.P.C. 93615). As of 2021, it has not been named.
Comet ISON, formally known as C/2012 S1, was a sungrazing comet from the Oort cloud which was discovered on 21 September 2012 by Vitaly Nevsky and Artyom Novichonok.
276P/Vorobjov is a Jupiter-family comet discovered on 15 October 2012 by Tomáš Vorobjov on three 120-s images taken remotely using the 0.81-m f/7 Ritchey-Chretien Schulman Telescope located at the Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter via the Sierra Stars Observatory Network in the course of a minor-planet search survey undertaken as part of the International Astronomical Search Collaboration (IASC) school campaigns. After posting on the Minor Planet Center's NEOCP webpage, other observers have commented on the object's cometary appearance. The discovery was announced by the Minor Planet Center on 18 October, three days after the discovery.
C/2012 K1 (PanSTARRS) is a retrograde Oort cloud comet discovered at magnitude 19.7, 8.7 AU from the Sun on 17 May 2012 using the Pan-STARRS telescope located near the summit of Haleakalā, on the island of Maui in Hawaii (U.S.).
C/2013 R1 (Lovejoy) is a long-period comet discovered on 7 September 2013 by Terry Lovejoy using a 0.2-meter (8 in) Schmidt–Cassegrain telescope. It is the fourth comet discovered by Terry Lovejoy. C/2013 R1 crossed the celestial equator on 14 October 2013, becoming a better Northern Hemisphere object.
C/2013 V5 (Oukaimeden) is a retrograde Oort cloud comet discovered on 12 November 2013 by Oukaimeden Observatory at an apparent magnitude of 19.4 using a 0.5-meter (20 in) reflecting telescope.
72P/Denning–Fujikawa is a periodic comet discovered on 4 October 1881 by William Frederick Denning. The comet was not seen at another apparition until recovered by Shigehisa Fujikawa in 1978. From 29 December 1978 until 17 June 2014, the comet was lost. On 17 June 2014 the comet was recovered by Hidetaka Sato. It was last observed in 2014.
C/2013 US10 (Catalina) is an Oort cloud comet discovered on 31 October 2013 by the Catalina Sky Survey at an apparent magnitude of 19 using a 0.68-meter (27 in) Schmidt–Cassegrain telescope. From September 2015 to February 2016 the comet was around apparent magnitude 6. The comet took around a million years to complete half an orbit from its furthest distance in the Oort cloud and should be ejected from the Solar System over many millions of years.
C/2014 Q3 (Borisov) is a periodic comet discovered at apparent magnitude 17 on 22 August 2014 by amateur astronomer Gennadiy Borisov using a 0.3-meter (12 in) astrograph. It is the third comet discovered by Borisov. The comet is best viewed from the northern hemisphere.
C/2015 V2 (Johnson) is a hyperbolic comet discovered on 3 November 2015 by Jess Johnson at an apparent magnitude of 17.1 using a 0.68-meter (27 in) Schmidt–Cassegrain telescope. Its incoming orbit had a Semimajor Axis of 59,200 AU, but will have a hyperbolic orbit after leaving the solar system, with an eccentricity of 1.0009. The comet was expected to be able to be seen with binoculars in late May 2017 in the Northern Hemisphere, with a magnitude of 6 to 7, but the comet was fainter than predicted, reaching a magnitude of 7.1 on June 21.