Doris ( minor planet designation: 48 Doris) is one of the largest

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 ...

asteroids. It was discovered on 19 September 1857 by

Hermann Goldschmidt Hermann Mayer Salomon Goldschmidt (June 17, 1802 – August 30 or September 10 1866) was a German-French astronomer and painter who spent much of his life in France. He started out as a painter, but after attending a lecture by the famous Fren ...

from his balcony in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

Name

To find a name for the object,

Jacques Babinet Jacques Babinet (; 5 March 1794 – 21 October 1872) was a French physicist, mathematician, and astronomer who is best known for his contributions to optics. Biography His father was Jean Babinet and mother, Marie‐Anne Félicité Bonneau d ...

of the

Academy of Sciences An academy of sciences is a type of learned society or academy (as special scientific institution) dedicated to sciences that may or may not be state funded. Some state funded academies are tuned into national or royal (in case of the Unit ...

created a shortlist and asked the

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, althoug ...

Élie de Beaumont to make the selection. De Beaumont chose Doris, after an Oceanid in

Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and nature of the world, the lives and activities ...

. Since Doris was discovered on the same night as 49 Pales, de Deaumont suggested naming the two "The Twins".

Physical characteristics

occultation An occultation is an event that occurs when one object is hidden from the observer by another object that passes between them. The term is often used in astronomy, but can also refer to any situation in which an object in the foreground blocks ...

on 19 March 1981 suggested a diameter of 219±25 km. Observations of an occultation on 14 October 1999, using four well-placed

chords Chord may refer to: * Chord (music), an aggregate of musical pitches sounded simultaneously ** Guitar chord a chord played on a guitar, which has a particular tuning * Chord (geometry), a line segment joining two points on a curve * Chord ( ...

, indicate an ellipsoid of 278×142 km and that 48 Doris is an extremely irregularly shaped object.

Conjunction

Doris will pass within 0.019 AU of

Pallas Pallas may refer to: Astronomy * 2 Pallas asteroid ** Pallas family, a group of asteroids that includes 2 Pallas * Pallas (crater), a crater on Earth's moon Mythology * Pallas (Giant), a son of Uranus and Gaia, killed and flayed by Athena * Pa ...

in June 2132.

In popular culture

48 Doris is a location in the text-based science fiction game Federation 2.

Notes

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:000048 Background asteroids Doris Doris CG-type asteroids (Tholen) Ch-type asteroids (SMASS) 18570919 Objects observed by stellar occultation