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50719 Elizabethgriffin (provisional designation 2000 EG140) is a stony Maria asteroid and exceptionally slow rotator from the central region of the asteroid belt, approximately 3.3 kilometers (2.1 miles) in diameter. It was discovered on 1 March 2000, by astronomers with the Catalina Sky Survey at Mount Lemmon Observatory, Arizona, United States. It was named for Canadian astronomer Elizabeth Griffin.[1]
| Discovery [1][2] | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | CSS |
| Discovery site | Mount Lemmon Obs. |
| Discovery date | 1 March 2000 |
| Designations | |
| (50719) Elizabethgriffin | |
Named after | Elizabeth Griffin (Canadian astronomer) |
| 2000 EG140 · 2001 MV3 | |
| main-belt · Maria [3][4] | |
| Orbital characteristics [2] | |
| Epoch 27 April 2019 (JD 2458600.5) | |
| Uncertainty parameter 0 | |
| Observation arc | 19.92 yr (7,276 d) |
| Aphelion | 2.9305 AU |
| Perihelion | 2.2365 AU |
| 2.5835 AU | |
| Eccentricity | 0.1343 |
| 4.15 yr (1,517 d) | |
| 73.206° | |
| 0° 14m 14.64s / day | |
| Inclination | 14.303° |
| 262.84° | |
| 30.265° | |
| Physical characteristics | |
| 3.307±0.134 km[5][6] | |
| 1256.0159±63.4351 h[7] | |
| 0.370±0.065[5][6] | |
| S [8] | |
| 14.1[5] 14.2[1][2] 14.204±0.004 (R)[7] | |
The stony S-type asteroid is a member of the Maria family (506),[3][4] located in the Eunomia region in the intermediate main-belt. It orbits the Sun in the central main-belt at a distance of 2.2–2.9 AU once every 4 years and 2 months (1,517 days; semi-major axis of 2.58 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.13 and an inclination of 14° with respect to the ecliptic.[2] A first precovery was taken at Lowell Observatory (LONEOS) in 1998, extending the asteroid's observation arc by 2 years prior to its discovery.[1]
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This minor planet was numbered by the Minor Planet Center on 20 November 2002.[9] It was named after Elizabeth Griffin (born 1942) a Canadian astronomer who studies binary stars spectroscopically. She has been an advocate for the preservation and digitization of astronomic photographic plates.[1] The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 6 April 2019 (M.P.C. 112432).[9]
Slow rotator
In August 2010, a rotational lightcurve of Elizabethgriffin was obtained from photometric observations by astronomers at the Palomar Transient Factory in California. It gave an exceptionally long rotation period of 1256 hours with a brightness variation of 0.42 magnitude (U=2).[7] This makes the asteroid the 5th slowest rotating minor planet known to exist.
Diameter and albedo
According to the surveys carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Elizabethgriffin measures 3.3 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.37,[5][6] while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for stony asteroids of 0.21 and calculates a diameter of 3.4 kilometers with an absolute magnitude of 14.65.[8]
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