Download Between Love and War - SFA Physics and Astronomy

Minor Planet Sfasu
Between Love and War
If you are out and about in the early morning hours this week, you
might see what many call the “Morning Star.” It is the brightest
thing in the sky in the east just before sunrise. Astronomy
students at SFA learn that the Morning Star is not a star at all.
Instead it is the planet Venus bathed in intense sunlight.
Venus
° Sfasu
Mars
Venus (Greek: Aphrodite) is the goddess of love and beauty. The
planet is so named probably because it was the brightest of the
planets known to the ancients. Mars glimmers weakly in early
dawn. Look for it below Venus and a bit to the left. Mars (Greek:
Ares) is the god of War. The planet probably got this name due to
its red color.
Between Mars and Venus this week there is a small worldlet
much further out in the solar system. It is so far from us that it
can only been seen with a large telescope equipped with a cooled
digital camera.
Five years ago on a clear October night SFA graduate student Michael Johnson was wrapping up the
Astronomy 105 night lab at the SFA Observatory while Dr. Dan Bruton was taking a few digital
images of the sky using an 18” diameter telescope. Analysis of the images revealed a moving object
wandering through the background stars. These observations were submitted to the Minor Planet
Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who gave
the object a temporary designation of 1999 TJ17.
The astronomers were given credit for discovering
a minor planet, also known as an asteroid,
tumbling between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
With help from astronomers around the world,
enough data have been collected over the years
to allow astronomers to know precisely where it
has been and where it is going. Early in 2004,
SFA astronomers submitted the name "Sfasu"
(pronounced Sfä - sü) to the thirteen-person
international Committee for Small-Body
Nomenclature of the International Astronomical
Union. This week the proposed name was
officially accepted.
The minor planet Sfasu is estimated to be about 3 miles in diameter and is currently about
260,000,000 miles from Earth. We will not know what the surface of this asteroid looks like for some
time. Perhaps one day in the distant future astronomy classes can be held on Sfasu.
Additional Information
Sfasu is probably a cratered worldlet
much like Phobos - one of the two
captured moons of Mars. Last week
the European Space Agency’s Mars
Express spacecraft capture the highresolution picture of Phobos shown
to the right.
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Mars_
Express/SEM21TVJD1E_0.html
This discovery of Sfasu was a result
of a deliberate search for minor
planets between Mars and Jupiter.
This research project was supported
by an SFA Faculty Research Grant.
The SFA Observatory (Minor Planet
Center Code 740) is part of a
campaign to search for asteroids.
The asteroid was discovered using
an 18-inch diameter telescope that was originally used by NASA for lunar studies prior to the Apollo
program. This telescope has been in operation at SFA since 1976. Michael Johnson graduated
from SFA in 2003. Dr. Dan Bruton is an Associate Professor of Physics and Astronomy at SFA. The
observatory director Dr. Norman Markworth developed the telescope and camera control software.
For more information visit the SFA Observatory web site. http://observatory.sfasu.edu/
“SFASU the university has had a big impact on my life. Sfasu the asteroid will not have a big impact
on Earth.” -- Dr. Dan Bruton