102 Miriam

102 Miriam

Discovery[1]
Discovered by	Christian Heinrich Friedrich Peters
Discovery site	Litchfield Observatory
Discovery date	August 22, 1868
Designations
MPC designation	102
Named after	Miriam
Minor planet category	main belt [2]
Orbital characteristics[3]
Epoch November 30, 2008
Ap	3.3332 AU
Peri	1.9929 AU
Semi-major axis	2.66303 AU
Eccentricity	0.251655
Orbital period	1587.31 days (4.35 years)
Mean anomaly	108.084°
Inclination	5.176°
Longitude of ascending node	210.916°
Argument of peri	147.441°
Proper orbital elements
Physical characteristics
Dimensions	83.00 kilometres (51.57 mi) ± 1.9 kilometres (1.2 mi) Mean diameter[4]
Rotation period	15.789 hours [5]
Albedo	0.0507 ± 0.002 [4]
Spectral type	P (Tholen classification) [6] C (SMASSII classification) [6]
Absolute magnitude (H)	9.26 [7]

102 Miriam is a moderately large, very dark main belt asteroid. It was discovered by C. H. F. Peters on August 22, 1868 from Litchfield Observatory.^[1]

Peters named the asteroid after Miriam, the sister of Moses in the Old Testament. This caused some controversy, because at the time, asteroids were expected to be named after mythological figures, and the devout would not regard Biblical figures as such. According to fellow astronomer Edward S. Holden, Peters deliberately chose a name from the Bible so as to annoy an overly pious theology professor of his acquaintance.^[8]

References

1. ^ ^{a b} "Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000)". IAU: Minor Planet Center. http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/lists/NumberedMPs000001.html. Retrieved December 31, 2008. 
2. ^ "102 Miriam". JPL Small-Body Database. Jet Propulsion Laboratory. http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=102+Miriam. Retrieved December 31, 2008. 
3. ^ "(102) Miriam". AstDyS. Italy: University of Pisa. http://hamilton.dm.unipi.it/astdys/index.php?pc=1.1.0&n=102. Retrieved 31 December 2008. 
4. ^ ^{a b} Tedesco et al. (2004). "Supplemental IRAS Minor Planet Survey (SIMPS)". IRAS-A-FPA-3-RDR-IMPS-V6.0. Planetary Data System. Archived from the original on 2010-01-17. http://www.webcitation.org/5mqp8r4gD. Retrieved December 31, 2008. 
5. ^ Johnson (2008). "Lightcurve Analysis of 102 Miriam, 1433 Geramtina, and 2648 Owa". The Minor Planet Bulletin 35 (4): 151–152. Bibcode 2008MPBu...35..150J. 
6. ^ ^{a b} Neese (2005). "Asteroid Taxonomy". EAR-A-5-DDR-TAXONOMY-V5.0. Planetary Data System. Archived from the original on 2010-01-16. http://www.webcitation.org/5mpuUMP1Q. Retrieved December 27, 2008. 
7. ^ Tholen (2007). "Asteroid Absolute Magnitudes". EAR-A-5-DDR-ASTERMAG-V11.0.. Planetary Data System. http://www.psi.edu/pds/resource/astermag.html. Retrieved December 31, 2008. ^{[dead link]}
8. ^ Lutz D. Schmadel, Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, p. 25.