Dorothea (
minor planet designation
A formal minor-planet designation is, in its final form, a number–name combination given to a minor planet (asteroid, centaur, trans-Neptunian object and dwarf planet but not comet). Such designation always features a leading number (catalog or ...
: 339 Dorothea) 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
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.
...
that was discovered by German astronomer
Max Wolf
Maximilian Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf (21 June 1863 – 3 October 1932) was a German astronomer and a pioneer in the field of astrophotography. He was the chairman of astronomy at the University of Heidelberg and director of the Heidelberg-Kà ...
on 25 September 1892 in
Heidelberg
Heidelberg (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: ''Heidlberg'') is a city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914 ...
.
This is a member of the dynamic
Eos family The Eos family (''adj. Eoan'' ; ) is a very large asteroid family located in the outer region of the asteroid belt. The family of K-type asteroids is believed to have formed as a result of an ancient catastrophic collision. The family's parent body ...
of asteroids that were probably formed as the result of a collisional breakup of a parent body.
References
External links
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000339
Discoveries by Max Wolf
Named minor planets
000339
000339
18920925
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