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A near-Earth object (NEO) is any small Solar System body whose orbit brings it into proximity with Earth. By convention, a Solar System body is a NEO if its closest approach to the Sun (perihelion) is less than 1.3 astronomical units (AU). If a NEO's orbit crosses the Earth's orbit, and the object is larger than 140 meters (460 ft) across, it is considered a potentially hazardous object (PHO). Most known PHOs and NEOs are asteroids, but a small fraction are comets.
The Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) project is a collaboration of the United States Air Force, NASA, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Laboratory for the systematic detection and tracking of near-Earth objects. LINEAR was responsible for the majority of asteroid discoveries from 1998 until it was overtaken by the Catalina Sky Survey in 2005. As of 15 September 2011, LINEAR had detected 231,082 new small Solar System bodies, of which at least 2,423 were near-Earth asteroids and 279 were comets. The instruments used by the LINEAR program are located at Lincoln Laboratory's Experimental Test Site (ETS) on the White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) near Socorro, New Mexico.
Brian Geoffrey Marsden was a British astronomer and the longtime director of the Minor Planet Center (MPC) at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian.
Eleanor Francis "Glo" Helin was an American astronomer. She was principal investigator of the Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) program of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Lowell Observatory Near-Earth-Object Search (LONEOS) was a project designed to discover asteroids and comets that orbit near the Earth. The project, funded by NASA, was directed by astronomer Ted Bowell of Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona. The LONEOS project began in 1993 and ran until the end of February 2008.
Schelte John "Bobby" Bus is an American astronomer and discoverer of minor planets at the Institute for Astronomy of the University of Hawaii and deputy director of NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) at the Mauna Kea Observatory in Hawaii, United States.
John Broughton is an Australian amateur astronomer and artist. He is among the most prolific discoverers of minor planets worldwide, credited by the Minor Planet Center with more than a thousand discoveries made between 1997 and 2008. His observations are done at Reedy Creek Observatory, in Queensland, Australia.
Roy A. Tucker (born 1951 in Jackson, Mississippi) is an American astronomer best known for the co-discovery of near-Earth asteroid 99942 Apophis (formerly known as 2004 MN4) along with David J. Tholen and Fabrizio Bernardi of the University of Hawaii. He is a prolific discoverer of minor planets, credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery of 702 numbered minor planets between 1996 and 2010. He has also discovered two comets: 328P/LONEOS–Tucker and C/2004 Q1, a Jupiter-family and near-parabolic comet, respectively.
Henry E. Holt was an American astronomer and prolific discoverer of minor planets and comets, who has worked as a planetary geologist at the United States Geological Survey and Northern Arizona University.
Gary Hug is an American amateur astronomer and a prolific discoverer of minor planets, who, along with Graham E. Bell, operates the Farpoint Observatory and Sandlot Observatory in Kansas, United States.
Timothy Bruce Spahr is an American astronomer and prolific discoverer of minor planets.
Piero Sicoli is an Italian astronomer and discoverer of minor planets, observing at the Italian Sormano Astronomical Observatory. As the observatory's coordinator, he is responsible for close encounters computation of near-Earth objects (NEOs), orbit computations, and identification of asteroids. The Observatory's focus is the examination and tracking of NEOs in Solar System.
Marc William Buie is an American astronomer and prolific discoverer of minor planets who works at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado in the Space Science Department. Formerly he worked at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, and was the Sentinel Space Telescope Mission Scientist for the B612 Foundation, which is dedicated to protecting Earth from asteroid impact events.
Farpoint Observatory is an astronomical observatory owned and operated by the Northeast Kansas Amateur Astronomers' League, or NEKAAL. It is located on the grounds of Mission Valley High School at Eskridge, near Auburn, Kansas, approximately 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Topeka, Kansas, United States.
The Palomar Planet-Crossing Asteroid Survey (PCAS) was an astronomical survey, initiated by American astronomers Eleanor Helin and Eugene Shoemaker at the U.S Palomar Observatory, California, in 1973. The program is responsible for the discovery of 95 near-Earth Objects including 17 comets, while the Minor Planet Center directly credits PCAS with the discovery of 20 numbered minor planets during 1993–1994. PCAS ran for nearly 25 years until June 1995. It had an international extension, INAS, and was the immediate predecessor of the outstandingly successful NEAT program.
James Whitney Young is an American astronomer who worked in the field of asteroid research. After nearly 47 years with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at their Table Mountain Facility, Young retired July 16, 2009.
Michel Ory is a Swiss amateur astronomer and a prolific discoverer of minor planets and comets, who was one of five winners of the 2009 Edgar Wilson Award for his discovery of 304P/Ory, a periodic comet of the Jupiter family on 27 August 2008, using a 24-inch f/3.9 reflector at the Jura Observatory in Switzerland. In 2018, he was awarded a Gene Shoemaker NEO Grant which will improve the robotic survey he conducts in collaboration with Claudine Rinner at the Oukaïmeden Observatory in Morocco.
(285263) 1998 QE2, provisional designation 1998 QE2, is a dark asteroid and synchronous binary system, classified as near-Earth object and potentially hazardous asteroid of the Amor group, approximately 3 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 19 August 1998, by astronomers of the LINEAR program at Lincoln Laboratory's Experimental Test Site near Socorro, New Mexico, in the United States. Its sub-kilometer minor-planet moon was discovered by radar on 30 May 2013.
Erich Meyer is an Austrian engineer, amateur astronomer and discoverer of asteroids.
Robert D. Stephens is an American amateur astronomer and a prolific photometrist of minor planets at the Center for Solar System Studies, Rancho Cucamonga in California, United States.
References
- 1 2 "Minor Planet Discoverers (by number)". Minor Planet Center. 4 September 2016. Retrieved 23 September 2016.
- 1 2 "The 1998 Gene Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients". The Planetary Society. 1998. Archived from the original on 7 January 2009. Retrieved 6 May 2009.
- 1 2 Schmadel, Lutz D. (2007). "(18292) Zoltowski". Dictionary of Minor Planet Names – (18292) Zoltowski. Springer Berlin Heidelberg. p. 851. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-29925-7_9487. ISBN 978-3-540-00238-3.
- ↑ "Asteroid 1998 QE2 some observations by F. B. Zoltowski". NASA.
- ↑ "Close shave with asteroid 1999 AN10". BBC.
- ↑ "World's end". New Scientist. 29 May 1999. Retrieved 6 May 2009.
- ↑ Arent, Lindsey. "Asteroid, Inbound, 2044 AD". Wired.
- ↑ "Planetary Society Grant Recipient Tracks Intriguing Near Earth Object". Science Daily.
- ↑ "MPC/MPO/MPS Archive". Minor Planet Center. Retrieved 26 July 2016.