6500 Kodaira, provisional designation , is a highly eccentric, 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. ...

and sizable Mars-crosser from the central regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 10 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 15 March 1993, by Japanese amateur astronomers

Kin Endate is a Japanese amateur astronomer who has discovered hundreds of asteroids, most of them in collaboration with Kazuro Watanabe, placing him among the most prolific discoverers of minor planets. Career in astronomy Kin Endate was born in Iwa ...

and

Kazuro Watanabe is a Japanese amateur astronomer and prolific discoverer of minor planets. He was born in Hokkaidō, Japan and is a member of the ''Astronomical Society of Japan'' as well as of the ''Oriental Astronomical Association''. Through publications ...

Kitami Observatory Kitami Observatory is an astronomical observatory in the Kitami-Abashiri Region Cultural Centre in eastern Hokkaidō, Japan. Its observatory code is 400. It is 0.72344 Earth radii from the rotation axis and +0.68811 Earth radii from the equatorial ...

in eastern Hokkaidō, Japan. It was named for Japanese astronomer Keiichi Kodaira.

Orbit and classification

''Kodaira'' orbits the Sun at a distance of 1.6–3.9 AU once every 4 years and 7 months (1,670 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.42 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 29 ° with respect to the ecliptic. In April 1970, it was first identified as at the Chilean Cerro El Roble Station, extending 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 ...

by 23 years prior to its official discovery observation at Kitami.

Physical characteristics

In the

SMASS classification An asteroid spectral type is assigned to asteroids based on their emission spectrum, color, and sometimes albedo. These types are thought to correspond to an asteroid's surface composition. For small bodies that are not internally differentiat ...

, ''Kodaira'' is carbonaceous and uncommon

B-type asteroid B-type asteroids are a relatively uncommon type of carbonaceous asteroid, falling into the wider C-group; the 'B' indicates these objects are spectrally blue. In the asteroid population, B-class objects can be found in the outer asteroid belt, an ...

, of which only a few dozen bodies are currently known.

Rotation period

In October 2014, a rotational lightcurve of ''Kodaira'' was obtained from photometric observations by American astronomer

Robert Stephens Sir Robert Graham Stephens (14 July 193112 November 1995) was a leading English actor in the early years of Britain's Royal National Theatre. He was one of the most respected actors of his generation and was at one time regarded as the natur ...

at the Center for Solar System Studies () in California. Lightcurve analysis gave a well-defined

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 hours with a brightness variation of 0.78 magnitude (). Previous observations at Montgomery College Observatory (MCO), the Preston Gott and McDonald Observatories, and at the

Palomar Transient Factory The Palomar Transient Factory (PTF, obs. code: I41), was an astronomical survey using a wide-field survey camera designed to search for optical transient and variable sources such as variable stars, supernovae, asteroids and comets. The projec ...

gave similar periods between 5.398 and 5.496 hours ().

Diameter and albedo

According to first-year results from the NEOWISE mission of 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, ...

, ''Kodaira'' measures 9.5 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 ...

of 0.15, while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for carbonaceous asteroids of 0.057 and calculates a diameter of 16.8 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 12.6.

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 Keiichi Kodaira (born 1937), Japanese astronomer and director of

NAOJ The (NAOJ) is an astronomy, astronomical research organisation comprising several facilities in Japan, as well as an observatory in Hawaii and Chile. It was established in 1988 as an amalgamation of three existing research organizations - the To ...

, whose interests lie in astrophysics and galactic physics. In the 1980s, Kodaira was head of

IAU The International Astronomical Union (IAU; french: link=yes, Union astronomique internationale, UAI) is a nongovernmental organisation with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach ...

's commission of ''Theory of Stellar Atmospheres'' (comm. 36). He was also instrumental for the completion of the

Subaru Telescope is the telescope of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, located at the Mauna Kea Observatory on Hawaii. It is named after the open star cluster known in English as the Pleiades. It had the largest monolithic primary mirror in the wo ...

project, of which he was the scientific director since its inception. The approved naming citation was published by the

Minor Planet Center The Minor Planet Center (MPC) is the official body for observing and reporting on minor planets under the auspices of the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Founded in 1947, it operates at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Function ...

on 1 June 1996 ().

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:Kodaira 006500 Discoveries by Kin Endate Discoveries by Kazuro Watanabe Named minor planets 006500 19930315