900 Rosalinde ( ''prov. designation'': ''or'' ) is an elongated background asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, that has a mean-diameter of approximately . It was discovered on 10 August 1918, by 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-K� ...

at the

Heidelberg-Königstuhl State Observatory Heidelberg-Königstuhl State Observatory (german: Landessternwarte Heidelberg-Königstuhl) is a historic astronomical observatory located near the summit of the Königstuhl hill in the city of Heidelberg in Germany. The predecessor of the curre ...

in southwest Germany. The lengthy S/

D-type asteroid D-type asteroids have a very low albedo and a featureless reddish Asteroid spectral types, spectrum. It has been suggested that they have a composition of organic-rich silicates, carbon and anhydrous silicates, possibly with water ice in their inte ...

has a

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 16.6 hours. It was likely named after "Rosalinde", a character in the operetta '' Die Fledermaus'' by

Johann Strauss II Johann Baptist Strauss II (25 October 1825 – 3 June 1899), also known as Johann Strauss Jr., the Younger or the Son (german: links=no, Sohn), was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed ov ...

Orbit and classification

''Rosalinde'' is a non-

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

asteroid of the main belt's background population when applying the hierarchical clustering method to its

proper orbital elements __NOTOC__ The proper orbital elements or proper elements of an orbit are constants of motion of an object in space that remain practically unchanged over an astronomically long timescale. The term is usually used to describe the three quantitie ...

. It orbits the Sun in the

inner Interior may refer to: Arts and media * ''Interior'' (Degas) (also known as ''The Rape''), painting by Edgar Degas * ''Interior'' (play), 1895 play by Belgian playwright Maurice Maeterlinck * ''The Interior'' (novel), by Lisa See * Interior de ...

asteroid belt at a distance of 2.1–2.9 AU once every 3 years and 11 months (1,421 days;

semi-major axis In geometry, the major axis of an ellipse is its longest diameter: a line segment that runs through the center and both foci, with ends at the two most widely separated points of the perimeter. The semi-major axis (major semiaxis) is the long ...

of 2.47 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.16 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 12 ° with respect to the ecliptic. 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 ...

begins at

with its official discovery observation on 10 August 1918.

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 probably named after the character "Rosalinde", Eisenstein's wife, in the operetta '' Die Fledermaus'' by

(1825–1899), after whom 4559 Strauss was named. Rosalinde's maid in the operetta, "Adele", is likely the namesake chosen by Wolf for another asteroid,

812 Adele 812 Adele ('' prov. designation:'' ''or'' ) is an elongated Eunomia asteroid from the central regions of the asteroid belt. It was discovered on 8 September 1915, by Russian astronomer Sergey Belyavsky at the Simeiz Observatory on the Crimean pe ...

Lutz Schmadel Lutz Dieter Schmadel (2 July 1942, in Berlin – 21 October 2016) was a German astronomer and a prolific discoverer of asteroids, who worked at the Astronomisches Rechen-Institut (ARI) of the University of Heidelberg. His special interest was t ...

, the author of the ''Dictionary of Minor Planet Names'' learned about the discoverer's source of inspiration from private communications with Dutch astronomer

Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld (; 21 October 1921 – 30 March 2015) was a Dutch astronomer. Background In a jointly credited trio with Tom Gehrels and her husband Cornelis Johannes van Houten, she was the discoverer of many thousands of aster ...

, who worked as a young astronomer at the discovering Heidelberg Observatory.

Physical characteristics

''Rosalinde'' is an S-type/ D-type in the SMASS-I spectral type-classification by Xu (1995), which surveyed and classified a total of 221 objects. However, ''Rosalinde''s classification, with its moderate albedo of 0.1 ''(see below)'' does not correspond to more modern taxonomies such as the Bus–Binzel

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 ...

(II), where the bright S-types and the dark D-types do not have intermediate albedos.

Rotation period

In June 2011, a rotational lightcurve of ''Rosalinde'' was obtained from photometric observations by Meaghann Stoelting and David DeGraffat at the

Stull Observatory Stull Observatory is an astronomical observatory owned and operated by Alfred University located in Alfred, New York (USA) and named after John Stull, who helped establish the observatory in 1966. It is notable for housing seven independentl ...

of the Alfred University in New York. Lightcurve analysis gave a

of hours with a brightness variation of magnitude (). Assuming an equatorial view, the observers also constrained the object's elongated shape to be at least 36% longer than wide. The result supersedes a tentative period determination by French amateur astronomer René Roy from May 2007 (). Additional observation by the Spanish OBAS group gave a period of hours with an amplitude of magnitude (). In 2016, a modeled lightcurve gave a concurring sidereal period of hours using data from the Uppsala Asteroid Photometric Catalogue, 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 ...

survey, and individual observers (such as above), as well as sparse-in-time photometry from the

NOFS The United States Naval Observatory Flagstaff Station (NOFS), is an astronomical observatory near Flagstaff, Arizona, US. It is the national dark-sky observing facility under the United States Naval Observatory (USNO). NOFS and USNO combine a ...

, the Catalina Sky Survey, and the La Palma surveys . The study also determined two spin axes of (276.0°, 70.0°) and (90.0°, 39.0°) in ecliptic coordinates (λ, β).

Diameter and albedo

According to the survey carried out 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 Japanese Akari satellite, and 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, ...

(WISE), ''Rosalinde'' measures (), () and () 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 (), () and (), respectively. The ''Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link'' assumes an albedo of 0.0931 and calculates a diameter of 18.75 kilometers based on 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 11.83. Alternative mean-diameter measurements published by the WISE team include (), () and () with corresponding albedos of (), () and (). On 7 June 2015, an asteroid occultation gave a best-fit ellipse dimension of 19.0 × 19.0 kilometers. These timed observations are taken when the asteroid passes in front of a distant star.

References

External links

Lightcurve Database Query
(LCDB), at ''www.minorplanet.info''
Dictionary of Minor Planet Names
Google books

– ''Geneva Observatory'', Raoul Behrend
Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000)
– Minor Planet Center * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rosalinde 000900 Discoveries by Max Wolf Named minor planets Johann Strauss II 19180810