168 Sibylla is a large
main-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 ...
asteroid, discovered by Canadian-American astronomer
J. C. Watson on September 28, 1876. It was most likely named for the
Sibyl
The sibyls (, singular ) were prophetesses or oracles in Ancient Greece.
The sibyls prophesied at holy sites.
A sibyl at Delphi has been dated to as early as the eleventh century BC by PausaniasPausanias 10.12.1 when he described local tradi ...
s, referring to the Ancient Greek female oracles.
[ Based upon its spectrum this object is classified as a ]C-type asteroid
C-type (carbonaceous) asteroids are the most common variety, forming around 75% of known asteroids. They are volatile-rich and distinguished by a very low albedo because their composition includes a large amount of carbon, in addition to rocks ...
, which indicates it is very dark and composed of primitive carbonaceous
Carbon () is a chemical element with the symbol C and atomic number 6. It is nonmetallic and tetravalent—its atom making four electrons available to form covalent chemical bonds. It belongs to group 14 of the periodic table. Carbon makes up ...
materials. 168 Sibylla is a Cybele asteroid, orbiting beyond most of the main-belt asteroids.
Photometric observations of this asteroid made at the Torino Observatory in Italy during 1990–1991 were used to determine a synodic rotation period of 23.82 ± 0.004 hours.[
]
References
External links
*
*
Cybele asteroids
Sibylla
Sybilla
Sibylla
C-type asteroids (Tholen)
Ch-type asteroids (SMASS)
18760928
{{C-beltasteroid-stub