859 Bouzaréah, provisional designation 1916 c, is a dark
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
asteroid belt about 74 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered by French astronomer
Frédéric Sy
Frédéric Sy was a French astronomer and a discoverer of minor planets.
He worked at the Paris Observatory from 1879 to 1887, and as the assistant astronomer at the Algiers Observatory, North Africa, from 1887 to 1918. While working in Algier ...
at the
Algiers Observatory in Algeria, North Africa, on 2 October 1916.
The asteroid orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.9–3.6
AU about once every 6 years (2,117 days) and
rotates around its axis in 23 hours.
Its low geometric albedo of 0.047 has been measured 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 asteroid was named after
Bouzaréah
Bouzareah or Bouzaréah ( ar, بوزريعة, būzareah, link=no) is a suburb of Algiers, Algeria. It had a population of 69,200 people in 1998[Algiers
Algiers ( ; ar, الجزائر, al-Jazāʾir; ber, Dzayer, script=Latn; french: Alger, ) is the capital and largest city of Algeria. The city's population at the 2008 Census was 2,988,145Census 14 April 2008: Office National des Statistiques ...]
.
Its designation, 1916 c, is a superseded version of the modern two-letter code
system of provisional designation, implemented just a few years later in 1925.
References
External links
Dictionary of Minor Planet Names Google books
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000859
Discoveries by Frédéric Sy
Named minor planets
19161002
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