170 Maria is a Main belt asteroid that was discovered by French astronomer Henri Joseph Perrotin on January 10, 1877.[3] Its orbit was computed by Antonio Abetti, and the asteroid was named after his sister, Maria. This is the namesake of the Maria asteroid family; one of the first asteroid families to be identified by Japanese astronomer Kiyotsugu Hirayama in 1918.[4]
In the Tholen classification system, this is categorized as a stony S-type asteroid.[2] Observations performed at the Palmer Divide Observatory in Colorado Springs, Colorado during 2007 produced a light curve with a period of 13.120 ± 0.002 hours and a brightness range of 0.21 ± 0.02 in magnitude. Previous measurements from 2000 gave 13.14 and 5.510 hour estimates for the period.[5] Based upon its spectrum, it is classified as an S-type asteroid.
An occultation of a star by Maria was observed from Manitoba, Canada, on June 10, 1997.
References
- ↑ Yeomans, Donald K., "170 Maria", JPL Small-Body Database Browser (NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory), retrieved 2013-04-07.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 DeMeo, Francesca E. et al. (July 2009), "An extension of the Bus asteroid taxonomy into the near-infrared", Icarus 202 (1): 160–180, Bibcode:2009Icar..202..160D, doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2009.02.005, retrieved 2013-04-08. See appendix A.
- ↑ "Numbered Minor Planets 1–5000", Discovery Circumstances (IAU Minor Planet center), retrieved 2013-04-07.
- ↑ Veeder, G. J. et al. (March 1995), "Eos, Koronis, and Maria family asteroids: Infrared (JHK) photometry", Icarus 114: 186–196, Bibcode:1995Icar..114..186V, doi:10.1006/icar.1995.1053, retrieved 2013-04-06.
- ↑ Warner, Brian D. (September 2007), "Asteroid Lightcurve Analysis at the Palmer Divide Observatory", Bulletin of the Minor Planets Section of the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers, Bibcode:2007MPBu...34...72W.
