Related papers: Recent arrivals to the main asteroid belt

Context. The discovery and tracking of 2018 LA marks only the third instance in history that the parent body of a fireball has been identified before its eventual disintegration in our atmosphere. The subsequent recovery of meteorites from…

Asteroid families are groups of minor planets which have a common origin in catastrophic disruptions. Young asteroid families are very interesting because they represent the product of their parent body's fragmentation before orbital and…

We report on the results of a systematic search for associated asteroid families for all active asteroids known to date. We find that 10 out of 12 main-belt comets (MBCs) and 5 out of 7 disrupted asteroids are linked with known or candidate…

For the first time, spectral signs of subtle coma activity were observed simultaneously on four main-belt primitive asteroids (145) Adeona, (704) Interamnia, (779) Nina, and (1474) Beira around their perihelion distances in September 2012,…

In an effort to understand the origin of the Main Belt Comets (MBCs) 7968 Elst-Pizzaro, 118401, and P/2005 U1, the dynamics of these three icy asteroids and a large number of hypothetical MBCs were studied. Results of extensive numerical…

We use the current orbital structure of large (>50km) asteroids in the main asteroid belt to constrain the evolution of the giant planets when they migrated from their primordial orbits to their current ones. Minton & Malhotra (2009) showed…

V-type asteroids are a taxonomic class whose surface is associated to a basaltic composition. The only known source of V-type asteroids in the Main Asteroid Belt is (4) Vesta, that is located in the inner part of the belt. However, many…

In 2003, we initiated a long-term adaptive optics campaign to study the orbit of various main-belt asteroidal systems. Here we present a consistent solution for the mutual orbits of four binary systems: 22 Kalliope, 45 Eugenia, 107 Camilla…

The mysterious solar system object 133P/(7968) Elst-Pizarro is dynamically asteroidal, yet displays recurrent comet-like dust emission. Two scenarios were hypothesized to explain this unusual behavior: (1) 133P is a classical comet from the…

We report the discovery of the minor planet 2003 VB12 (popularly named Sedna), the most distant object ever seen in the solar system. Pre-discovery images from 2001, 2002, and 2003 have allowed us to refine the orbit sufficiently to…

Asteroid discoveries are essential for planetary-defense efforts aiming to prevent impacts with Earth, including the more frequent megaton explosions from decameter impactors. While large asteroids ($\geq$100 km) have remained in the main…

We analyze a sample of 139 near-Earth asteroids (NEAs), defined as those that reach perihelion distances $q < 1.3$ au, and that also fulfill the conditions of approaching or crossing Jupiter's orbit (aphelion distances $Q > 4.8$ au), having…

Aims. 2015 BZ509 is the first asteroid confirmed to be in retrograde co-orbit resonance (or 1/-1 resonance) with the giant planets in the solar system. While Saturn is the only giant planet whose Trojans are not discovered until now, we…

The low velocity of interstellar asteroid 1I/'Oumuamua with respect to our galaxy's Local Standard of Rest implies it is young. Adopting the young age hypothesis, we assess possible origin systems for this interstellar asteroid and for…

While collisional families are common in the asteroid belt, only one is known in the Kuiper belt, linked to the dwarf planet Haumea. The characterization of Haumea's family helps to constrain its origin and, more generally, the collisional…

We report results from new and archival observations of the newly discovered active asteroid (248370) 2005 QN_137, which has been determined to be a likely main-belt comet based on a subsequent discovery that it is recurrently active near…

Explaining the origin of the orbit of 2000 CR105 (a ~ 230AU, q ~ 45AU) is a major test for our understanding of the primordial evolution of the outer Solar System. Gladman et al. (2001) showed that this objects could not have been a normal…

We report on our search for genetically related asteroids amongst the near-Earth object (NEO) population - families of NEOs akin to the well known main belt asteroid families. We used the technique proposed by Fu et al. (2005) supplemented…

Here, we explore some peculiar orbital features of the recently discovered asteroid A/2017 U1, which is a clear outlier when considering the average value of the eccentricity of known hyperbolic comets. As for the orientation of its orbit…

The debiased absolute-magnitude and orbit distributions as well as source regions for near-Earth objects (NEOs) provide a fundamental frame of reference for studies of individual NEOs and more complex population-level questions. We present…