Prospects for improving the masses of minor planets

Details Prospects for improving the masses of minor planets Prospects for improving the masses of minor planets

Apr 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008jsrs.meet...74h&link_type=abstract

"Proceedings of the "Journées Systèmes de Référence Spatio-temporels 2007". Observatoire de Paris, 17-19 September 2007. Editor:

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Among the largest uncertainties in the fundamental constants of astronomy are the masses of the minor planets. They constitute the largest source of uncertainty in the ephemerides of the inner planets. Few asteroid masses are known with an uncertainty of better than about 50%. With a few exceptions, minor planet masses are determined by observing the perturbation of a massive minor planet on a smaller one during a close encounter. The recent explosion of discoveries of minor planets and the increased accuracy of modern astrometric catalogs means that it may be possible to discover more such encounters. A series of simple filters were developed to search for these encounters. For example, three encounters were found with Ceres, which are almost certainly strong enough to provide a mass estimate with a significantly smaller uncertainty than current estimates prior to Dawn’s arrival there in 2015.

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