Space to Grow
Asteroid Investigation
Introduction
The term asteroid, or Minor Planet, is generally used to describe a diverse group of small bodies that drift around the Solar System in orbit around the Sun. It is thought that asteroids are the remnants of the protoplanetary disc that formed around the Sun when the Solar System was first created. Most of the small bodies came together to form the planets, but there were some left-overs that could not combine due to gravitational effects.
Asteroids are found in various locations throughout the Solar System:
- orbiting close to the Earth (Near Earth Asteroids)
- orbiting between Mars and Jupiter (in the Asteroid Belt)
- orbiting with Jupiter (Trojan Asteroids)
- orbiting between Jupiter and Neptune (Centaurs).
Hundreds of thousands of asteroids have been discovered so far, and many new discoveries are made every month!
Of particular interest are the Near Earth Asteroids that actually cross the Earth's orbit (Potentially Hazardous Asteroids) and have the potential to destroy life if they collide with the Earth. There are several programs running to find and track all Near Earth Asteroids (e.g. Spaceguard, LINEAR, NEAT). This effort must be continuous, as the orbits of the asteroids are influenced by the gravitational pull of the planets as well as other asteroids. For example, although astronomers may have determined an accurate orbit for a particular asteroid in one year, if that asteroid passes close to a planet, the gravitational pull of the planet can alter the orbit trajectory. It is important to keep an eye on these things but there are only limited resources to do it professionally.
With this project you could contribute to the effort to monitor asteroid motions by using the software program Astrometrica to discover and obtain accurate positions for selected asteroids. The positions derived will help refine the orbits of these celestial bodies and add to the growing database of information on these objects.
Complementary resource material for the Asteroid project can be found at the UK Faulkes Telescope Training Portal. To collaborate with overseas schools in this project, go to the UK Faulkes Telescope Asteroid Portal.
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