(

provisional designation Provisional designation in astronomy is the naming convention applied to astronomical objects immediately following their discovery. The provisional designation is usually superseded by a permanent designation once a reliable orbit has been calcu ...

) is a trans-Neptunian object and member of the

classical Kuiper belt A classical Kuiper belt object, also called a cubewano ( "QB1-o"), is a low-eccentricity Kuiper belt object (KBO) that orbits beyond Neptune and is not controlled by an orbital resonance with Neptune. Cubewanos have orbits with semi-major a ...

, approximately in diameter. It was discovered on 1 November 2010, by the Pan-STARRS 1 survey at Haleakala Observatory, Hawaii, United States. It 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 7.6 hours. It was numbered in September 2018 and remains unnamed.

Orbit and classification

Located beyond the orbit of

Neptune Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the farthest known planet in the Solar System. It is the fourth-largest planet in the Solar System by diameter, the third-most-massive planet, and the densest giant planet. It is 17 times ...

, is a non-resonant classical Kuiper belt object (cubewano) of the so-called hot population, whose members have higher inclinations than those of the cold population. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 38.0–48.1 AU once every 282 years and 2 months (103,060 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 43.02 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.12 and an inclination of 29 ° with respect to the ecliptic. The body's observation arc begins with its official discovery observation at Haleakala in November 2010. has been identified as a member of the Haumea family in a dynamical study led by Proudfoot and Ragozzine in 2019.

Numbering and naming

This minor planet was numbered 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 25 September 2018 (). As of 2018, it has not been named.

Physical characteristics

is an assumed carbonaceous body with a relatively low albedo ''(see below)''.

Rotation period

In 2011, a rotational lightcurve of was obtained from photometric observations in the S- and R-band by Susan Benecchi and

Scott Sheppard Scott Sander Sheppard (born 1977) is an American astronomer and a discoverer of numerous moons, comets and minor planets in the outer Solar System. He is an astronomer in the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism at the Carnegie Institution for Scie ...

taken with Carnegie's 2.5-meter Irénée du Pont telescope at the Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. Lightcurve analysis gave a

of hours with a brightness amplitude of 0.30 magnitude ().

Diameter and albedo

According to Michael Brown and the ''Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link'', measures 501 and 505 kilometers in diameter, based on an absolute magnitude of 4.6 and 5.0, assuming an albedo of 0.07 and 0.10 for the body's surface, respectively. The ''Johnston's archive'' estimates a smaller diameter of 443 kilometers.

References

External links

MPEC 2011-U10 : 2010 VK201
'' Minor Planet Electronic Circular'' – Minor Planet Center
List of Transneptunian Objects
''Minor Planet Center''
"Light curves of 32 large trans-Neptunian objects"

– Minor Planet Center * * {{DEFAULTSORT:2010 VK201 523645 523645 523645 523645 523645 20101101