137 Meliboea is a large, dark main-belt asteroid that was discovered by Austrian astronomer J. Palisa on April 21, 1874, the second of his many asteroid discoveries, and named after one of the three Meliboeas in Greek mythology. The largest body in the Meliboea family of asteroids that share similar orbital elements, only 791 Ani approaches its size. It is classified as a C-type asteroid and may be composed of carbonaceous materials.
Photometric observations of this asteroid made at the Torino Observatory in Italy during 1990–1991 were used to determine a synodic rotation period of 15.28 ± 0.02 hours.[5] A 2009 study at the Organ Mesa Observatory in Las Cruces, New Mexico found a period of 25.676 ± 0.001 hours and a brightness variation of 0.16 ± 0.02 in magnitude. They ruled out a period of 15 hours determined in previous studies.[3]
During 2002, 137 Meliboea was observed by radar from the Arecibo Observatory. The return signal matched an effective diameter of 144 ± 16 km. This is consistent with the asteroid dimensions computed through other means.[6]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Yeomans, Donald K., "137 Meliboea", JPL Small-Body Database Browser (NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory), retrieved 2013-03-25.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Carry, B. (December 2012), "Density of asteroids", Planetary and Space Science 73: 98-118, arXiv:1203.4336, Bibcode:2012P&SS...73...98C, doi:10.1016/j.pss.2012.03.009. See Table 1.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Pilcher, Frederick; Jardine, Don (April 2009), "Period Determinations for 31 Euphrosyne, 35 Leukothea 56 Melete, 137 Meliboea, 155 Scylla, and 264 Libussa", Bulletin of the Minor Planets Section of the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers 36 (2): 52–54, Bibcode:2009MPBu...36...52P
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Pravec, P. et al. (May 2012), "Absolute Magnitudes of Asteroids and a Revision of Asteroid Albedo Estimates from WISE Thermal Observations", Asteroids, Comets, Meteors 2012, Proceedings of the conference held May 16-20, 2012 in Niigata, Japan (1667), Bibcode:2012LPICo1667.6089P.
- ↑ di Martino, M. et al. (February 1994), "Lightcurves and rotational periods of nine main belt asteroids", Icarus 107 (2): 269–275, Bibcode:1994Icar..107..269D, doi:10.1006/icar.1994.1022.
- ↑ Magri, Christopher et al. (January 2007), "A radar survey of main-belt asteroids: Arecibo observations of 55 objects during 1999–2003", Icarus 186 (1): 126–151, Bibcode:2007Icar..186..126M, doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2006.08.018