Related papers: High Ecliptic Latitude Survey for Small Main-Belt …

Recent observations of asteroidal surfaces indicate the presence of materials that do not match the bulk lithology of the body. A possible explanation for the presence of these exogenous materials is that they are products of inter-asteroid…

We present the results of our Thousand Asteroid Light Curve Survey (TALCS) conducted with the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope in September 2006. Our untargeted survey detected 828 Main Belt asteroids to a limiting magnitude of g'~22.5…

Here we show an example of a young asteroid cluster located in a dynamically stable region, which was produced by partial disruption of a primitive body about 30 km in size. We estimate its age to be only 1.9 +/- 0.3 Myr, thus its…

Superfast rotators (SFRs) are small solar system objects that rotate faster than generally possible for a cohesionless rubble pile. Their rotational characteristics allow us to make inferences about their interior structure and composition.…

We present a method for calculating precise distances to asteroids using only two nights of data from a single location --- far too little for an orbit --- by exploiting the angular reflex motion of the asteroids due to Earth's axial…

The thermal properties of the surfaces of asteroids determine the magnitude of the drift rate cause by the Yarkovsky force. In the general case of Main Belt asteroids, the Yarkovsky force is indirectly proportional to the thermal inertia,…

We describe analytical and numerical collisional evolution calculations for the size distribution of icy bodies in the Kuiper Belt. For a wide range of bulk properties, initial masses, and orbital parameters, our results yield power-law…

We carried out low-resolution optical spectroscopy of 51 main-belt asteroids, most of which have highly-inclined orbits. They are selected from D-type candidates in the SDSS-MOC 4 catalog. Using the University of Hawaii 2.2 m telescope and…

Impact basins identified by Mariner 10 and Messenger flyby images provide us a fossilized record of the impactor flux of asteroids on Mercury during the last stages of the early Solar System. The distribution of these basins is not uniform…

Aims. We developed a six-part collisional evolution model of the main asteroid belt (MB) and used it to study the contribution of the different regions of the MB to the near-earth asteroids (NEAs). Methods. We built a statistical code…

Unlike NASA's original Kepler Discovery Mission, the renewed K2 Mission will stare at the plane of the Ecliptic, observing each field for approximately 75 days. This will bring new opportunities and challenges, in particular the presence of…

Asteroid modeling efforts in the last decade resulted in a comprehensive dataset of almost 400 convex shape models and their rotation states. This amount already provided a deep insight into physical properties of main-belt asteroids or…

The members of asteroid families have various shapes. We investigate the origin of their shapes by high-resolution impact simulations for catastrophic disruptions using a Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics code. Collisional remnants produced…

V-type asteroids in the inner Main Belt (a < 2.5 AU) and the HED meteorites are thought to be genetically related to one another as collisional fragments from the surface of the large basaltic asteroid 4 Vesta. We investigate this…

We present initial results from the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), a four-band all-sky thermal infrared survey that produces data well suited to measuring the physical properties of asteroids, and the NEOWISE enhancement to the…

We have developed a model to predict the post-collision brightness increase of sub-catastrophic collisions between asteroids and to evaluate the likelihood of a survey detecting these events. It is based on the cratering scaling laws of…

Asteroid surfaces are subjected to mechanical weathering processes that result in the development and evolution of regolith. Two proposed mechanisms--impact bombardment and thermal fatigue--have been proposed as viable and dominant…

Via joint analysis of a calibrated telescopic survey, which found scattering Kuiper Belt objects, and models of their expected orbital distribution, we measure the form of the scattering object's size distribution. Ruling out a single…

Asteroid families are groups of minor bodies produced by high-velocity collisions. After the initial dispersions of the parent bodies fragments, their orbits evolve because of several gravitational and non-gravitational effects,such as…

Dynamical models of the asteroid delivery from the main belt suggest that the current impact flux of diameter D>10 km asteroids on the Earth is 0.5-1 per Gyr. Studies of the Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA) population find a much higher flux, with…