Asteroid 2016 HO3 is currently in the constellation of Canes Venatici. The current Right Ascension of Asteroid 2016 HO3 is 12h 18m 42s and the Declination is +42° 49’ 20” (topocentric coordinates computed for the selected location: Greenwich, United Kingdom change ). The current magnitude of Asteroid 2016 HO3 is 22.39 (JPL).
Download PDF- A small asteroid has been discovered in an orbit around the sun that keeps it as a constant companion of Earth, and it will remain so for centuries to come.
- 2016 HO3 is a small near-Earth object, or NEO, measuring no more than 100 meters (330 feet) across that, while orbiting the sun, also appears to circle around the Earth as a 'quasi-satellite.' Only five quasi-satellites have been discovered so far, but 2016 HO3 is the most stable of them. The provenance of this object is unknown.
- Asteroid 2016 HO3 was first spotted on April 27, 2016, by the Pan-STARRS 1 asteroid survey telescope on Haleakala, Hawaii, operated by the University of Hawaii's Institute for Astronomy.
Abstract: A number of Earth co-orbital asteroids experience repeated transitionsbetween the quasi-satellite and horseshoe dynamical states. Asteroids 2001 GO2,2002 AA29, 2003 YN107 and 2015 SO2 are well-documented cases of such adynamical behaviour. These transitions depend on the gravitational influence ofother planets, owing to the overlapping of a multiplicity of secularresonances. Here, we show that the recently discovered asteroid (469219) 2016HO3 is a quasi-satellite of our planet -the fifth one, joining the ranks of(164207) 2004 GU9, (277810) 2006 FV35, 2013 LX28 and 2014 OL339. This new Earthco-orbital also switches repeatedly between the quasi-satellite and horseshoeconfigurations. Its current quasi-satellite episode started nearly 100 yr agoand it will end in about 300 yr from now. The orbital solution currentlyavailable for this object is very robust and our full N-body calculations showthat it may be a long-term companion (time-scale of Myr) to our planet. Amongthe known Earth quasi-satellites, it is the closest to our planet and as such,a potentially accessible target for future in situ study. Due to its presumablylengthy dynamical relationship with the Earth and given the fact that atpresent and for many decades this transient object remains well positioned withrespect to our planet, the results of spectroscopic studies of this small body,26-115 m, may be particularly useful to improve our understanding of theorigins -local or captured- of Earth's co-orbital asteroid population. Thenon-negligible effect of the uncertainty in the value of the mass of Jupiter onthe stability of this type of co-orbitals is also briefly explored.
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From: Raúl de la Fuente Marcos [view email][v1] Thu, 4 Aug 2016 12:47:47 UTC (1,445 KB)
[v2]Tue, 16 Aug 2016 21:38:27 UTC (1,445 KB)
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2016 Ho3 Moon
The orbit of 2016 HO3, around the Earth and the Sun. NASA/JPL-Caltech
Last year, researchers observed 2016 HO3, an almost satellite of our planet. New and more detailed observations, presented at the Annual Division for Planetary Sciences Meeting, have now confirmed that the object is definitely an asteroid and not a bit of space junk.
Anaconda python 3.7 download mac. After effects download mac. The trajectory of 2016 HO3 is peculiar, to say the least. It orbits around the Sun, and also around the Earth-Moon system, moving between 38 and 100 times the distance between our planet and the Moon. So it’s close enough to make its origin complex but a bit too far to be studied in detail.
To understand 2016 HO3, Assistant Professor Vishnu Reddy and his team from the University of Arizona decided to perform some ad hoc observations during a close approach. The team wasn’t able to constrain its size – which is definitely no larger than 100 meters (330 feet) – but could tell that it rotates on its axis twice in an hour and reflects light just like asteroids do.
'While HO3 is close to the Earth, its small size – possibly not larger than 100 feet – makes it challenging target to study,' Reddy said in a statement. 'Our observations show that HO3 rotates once every 28 minutes and is made of materials similar to asteroids.'
2016 HO3 is one of the five quasi-satellites of Earth and it’s the one with the most stable orbit. These objects are “almost” satellites because their orbit is not exactly stable and might change significantly over time. A lot of discovered quasi-satellites stop being one after a few years, but 2016 HO3 could be stable for hundreds of years. The Earth’s quasi-satellites come from the Near-Earth Object (NEO) population. Once in a while, we push them in a such a way that they hitch a ride along with us.
The team used the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) to characterize the object. Knowing that 2016 HO3 is an asteroid has implications beyond pure astronomy. If we want to establish how easy it is to explore and maybe even to mine an asteroid, having a target which is relatively close might be extremely useful.
'Of the near-Earth objects we know of, these types of objects would be the easiest to reach, so they could potentially make suitable targets for exploration,' said Christian Veillet, director of the LBT Observatory. 'With its binocular arrangement of two 8.4-meter [27.5-foot] mirrors, coupled with a very efficient pair of imagers and spectrographs like MODS, LBT is ideally suited to the characterization of these Earth's companions.'
With better telescopes, we might soon find that these objects are more common than we thought.
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