English

Long-lasting activity of asteroid (248370) 2005 QN 173

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics 2023-10-20 v1

Abstract

We present the results of observations of asteroid (248370) QN173_{173} obtained during July 2021 - January 2022 with three telescopes. Our analysis revealed the presence of the dust tail for about half of a year. The direct images of the asteroid were obtained with broad-band filters. No emissions were revealed in the spectra, and the spectrum of the asteroid closely matched that of a C-type asteroid. Created color and linear polarization variations along the tail were analyzed. The asteroid demonstrated a redder color compared to the Sun. Dramatic changes in dust productivity obtained in different filters were not detected. The grg-r color changes from 0.2m0.2^{m} to 0.7m0.7^{m} over the coma, and the linear polarization degree varies from about 1.21.2\% to 0.20.2\% and from 0.2-0.2\% to 1.5-1.5\% at the phase angle of 23.223.2^{\circ} and 8.168.16^{\circ}. The total dust mass ejected until the latest observation on October 10 is 4.2×1074.2 \times 10^7~kg, with a maximum rate of 2.6~kg\,s1^{-1} based on the Monte Carlo modeling of the dust tail. The estimated asteroid size is 1.3~km. It is shown that large particles are concentrated around the nucleus, whereas smaller ones dominate in the tail. The evolution of (248370) QN173_{173} orbit and the orbits of the sample of the 464 short-periodic comets were followed. Ten of them approached the asteroid's orbit. These objects are not genetically related, despite the very close distance of their orbits for a relatively long time.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2310.12495,
  title  = {Long-lasting activity of asteroid (248370) 2005 QN 173},
  author = {Oleksandra Ivanova and Javier Licandro and Fernando Moreno and Igor Luk'yanyk and Johannes Markkanen and Dusan Tomko and Marek Husarik and Antonio Cabrera-Lavers and Marcel Popescu and Elena Shablovinskaya and Olena Shubina},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2310.12495},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

pages 13; 5 tables; figures 12