1284 Latvia, provisional designation , is a rare-type

asteroid An asteroid is a minor planet of the inner Solar System. Sizes and shapes of asteroids vary significantly, ranging from 1-meter rocks to a dwarf planet almost 1000 km in diameter; they are rocky, metallic or icy bodies with no atmosphere. ...

from the middle region of the

asteroid belt The asteroid belt is a torus-shaped region in the Solar System, located roughly between the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Mars. It contains a great many solid, irregularly shaped bodies, of many sizes, but much smaller than planets, called ...

, approximately 37 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 27 July 1933, by German astronomer

Karl Reinmuth Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth (4 April 1892 in Heidelberg – 6 May 1979 in Heidelberg) was a German astronomer and a prolific discoverer of 395 minor planets. Scientific career From 1912 to 1957, Reinmuth was working as an astronomer at the Lande ...

Heidelberg Observatory Heidelberg (; Palatine German: ') is a city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914, of which roughly a quarter consisted of students. ...

in southern Germany, and named after the

Republic of Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

Orbit and classification

''Latvia'' orbits the Sun in the middle main-belt at a distance of 2.2–3.1 AU once every 4 years and 4 months (1,572 days). Its orbit has an

eccentricity Eccentricity or eccentric may refer to: * Eccentricity (behavior), odd behavior on the part of a person, as opposed to being "normal" Mathematics, science and technology Mathematics * Off-Centre (geometry), center, in geometry * Eccentricity (g ...

of 0.17 and an

inclination Orbital inclination measures the tilt of an object's orbit around a celestial body. It is expressed as the angle between a Plane of reference, reference plane and the orbital plane or Axis of rotation, axis of direction of the orbiting object ...

of 11 ° with respect to the

ecliptic The ecliptic or ecliptic plane is the orbital plane of the Earth around the Sun. From the perspective of an observer on Earth, the Sun's movement around the celestial sphere over the course of a year traces out a path along the ecliptic again ...

. It was first identified as at Moscow Observatory () in 1925, and then as at

Lowell Observatory Lowell Observatory is an astronomical observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, United States. Lowell Observatory was established in 1894, placing it among the oldest observatories in the United States, and was designated a National Historic Landmark ...

in 1931. The body's

observation arc In observational astronomy, the observation arc (or arc length) of a Solar System body is the time period between its earliest and latest observations, used for tracing the body's path. It is usually given in days or years. The term is mostly use ...

begins with its official discovery observation at Heidelberg in 1933.

Physical characteristics

Spectral type

''Latvia'' is classified as a rare T and L type asteroid in the

Tholen Tholen () is a 25,000 people municipality in the southwest of the Netherlands. The municipality of Tholen takes its name from the town of Tholen, which is the largest population center in the municipality. The municipality consists of two peninsu ...

and SMASS taxonomy scheme, respectively, both indicating a featureless spectra of a dark and reddish body.

Rotation period

The so-far best rated rotational

lightcurve In astronomy, a light curve is a graph of light intensity of a celestial object or region as a function of time, typically with the magnitude of light received on the y axis and with time on the x axis. The light is usually in a particular frequ ...

of ''Latvia'' was obtained by the "Spanish Photometric Asteroid Analysis Group" (OBAS) in September 2015. Lightcurve analysis gave it a

rotation period The rotation period of a celestial object (e.g., star, gas giant, planet, moon, asteroid) may refer to its sidereal rotation period, i.e. the time that the object takes to complete a single revolution around its axis of rotation relative to the ...

of 9.55 hours with a brightness variation of 0.23

magnitude Magnitude may refer to: Mathematics *Euclidean vector, a quantity defined by both its magnitude and its direction *Magnitude (mathematics), the relative size of an object *Norm (mathematics), a term for the size or length of a vector *Order of ...

(). Previous photometric observations by James W. Brinsfield at Via Capote Observatory and French amateur astronomer

Laurent Bernasconi This is a list of minor-planet discoverers credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery of one or several minor planets (such as near-Earth and main-belt asteroids, Jupiter trojans and distant objects). , the discovery of 612,011 nu ...

gave a period of 9.552 and 9.644 hours with an amplitude of 0.10 and 0.21 magnitude, respectively (). The first rotational lightcurve obtained by Richard P. Binzel in the 1980s gave a twice a long period solution of 18 hours ().

Diameter and albedo

According to the surveys carried out by the Infrared Astronomical Satellite

IRAS The Infrared Astronomical Satellite (Dutch: ''Infrarood Astronomische Satelliet'') (IRAS) was the first space telescope to perform a survey of the entire night sky at infrared wavelengths. Launched on 25 January 1983, its mission lasted ten mo ...

, the Japanese

Akari Akari (ASTRO-F) was an infrared astronomy satellite developed by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, in cooperation with institutes of Europe and Korea. It was launched on 21 February 2006, at 21:28 UTC (06:28, 22 February JST) by M-V rocke ...

satellite, and NASA's

Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE, observatory code C51, Explorer 92 and SMEX-6) is a NASA infrared astronomy space telescope in the Explorers Program. It was launched in December 2009, and placed in hibernation mode in February 2011, ...

with its subsequent

NEOWISE Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE, observatory code C51, Explorer 92 and SMEX-6) is a NASA infrared astronomy space telescope in the Explorers Program. It was launched in December 2009, and placed in hibernation mode in February 2011, ...

mission, ''Latvia'' measures between 33.27 and 41.47 kilometers in diameter, and its surface has an

albedo Albedo (; ) is the measure of the diffuse reflection of sunlight, solar radiation out of the total solar radiation and measured on a scale from 0, corresponding to a black body that absorbs all incident radiation, to 1, corresponding to a body ...

between 0.083 and 0.13 (without preliminary results). The ''Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link'' adopts the results by IRAS, that is an albedo of 0.1045 and a diameter of 36.81 kilometers with an

absolute magnitude Absolute magnitude () is a measure of the luminosity of a celestial object on an inverse Logarithmic scale, logarithmic Magnitude (astronomy), astronomical magnitude scale. An object's absolute magnitude is defined to be equal to the apparent mag ...

of 10.24.

Naming

This

minor planet According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a minor planet is an astronomical object in direct orbit around the Sun that is exclusively classified as neither a planet nor a comet. Before 2006, the IAU officially used the term ''minor ...

was named after the

. Naming citation was first mentioned in ''

The Names of the Minor Planets Paul Herget (January 30, 1908 – August 27, 1981) was an American astronomer and director of the Cincinnati Observatory, who established the Minor Planet Center after World War II. Career Herget taught astronomy at the University of Cincinna ...

'' by

Paul Herget Paul Herget (January 30, 1908 – August 27, 1981) was an American astronomer and director of the Cincinnati Observatory, who established the Minor Planet Center after World War II. Career Herget taught astronomy at the University of Cincinna ...

in 1955 ().

References

External links

Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB)
query form

)
Dictionary of Minor Planet Names
Google books

– Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend

– Minor Planet Center * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Latvia 001284 Discoveries by Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth Named minor planets 001284 001284 19330727