 Orbit ofWiles (blue), theinner planets andJupiter (outermost) | |
| Discovery[1] | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | C. J. van Houten I. van Houten-G. T. Gehrels |
| Discovery date | 29 September 1973 |
| Designations | |
| (9999) Wiles | |
Named after | Andrew Wiles (British mathematician)[2] |
| 4196 T-2 · 1995 EM8 | |
| main-belt · Koronis[3] | |
| Orbital characteristics[1] | |
| Epoch 4 September 2017 (JD 2458000.5) | |
| Uncertainty parameter 0 | |
| Observation arc | 43.36 yr (15,837 days) |
| Aphelion | 3.0391AU |
| Perihelion | 2.6386 AU |
| 2.8388 AU | |
| Eccentricity | 0.0705 |
| 4.78yr (1,747 days) | |
| 114.03° | |
| 0° 12m 21.96s / day | |
| Inclination | 3.1995° |
| 76.364° | |
| 234.93° | |
| Physical characteristics | |
| Dimensions | 5.78 km(calculated)[3] 7.148±0.065 km[4][5] |
| 3.47±0.020h[6] 3.482±0.0005 h[7] | |
| 0.24(assumed)[3] 0.262±0.023[4][5] | |
| LS[8] · S[3] · C[9] | |
| 12.8[4] · 12.906±0.002(R)[7] · 12.890±0.080(R)[6] · 13.0[1] · 13.04±0.44[8] · 13.36[3] | |
9999 Wiles, provisional designation4196 T-2, is a Koronianasteroid from the outer region of theasteroid belt, approximately 6 to 7 kilometers in diameter. It was named after British mathematicianAndrew Wiles.[2]
Wiles was discovered on 29 September 1973, by Dutch astronomer coupleIngrid andCornelis van Houten at Leiden andTom Gehrels atPalomar Observatory, California, United States.[10] The body'sobservation arc begins at Palomar, 10 days prior to its official discovery observation.[10]
Thesurvey designation "T-2" stands for the secondPalomar–Leiden Trojan survey, named after the fruitful collaboration of the Palomar andLeiden Observatory in the 1960s and 1970s. Gehrels used Palomar'sSamuel Oschin telescope (also known as the 48-inch Schmidt Telescope), and shipped thephotographic plates to Ingrid and Cornelis van Houten at Leiden Observatory whereastrometry was carried out. The trio are credited with the discovery of several thousand minor planets.[11]
The asteroid is a member of theKoronis family, a collisional group consisting of a few hundred known bodies with nearlyecliptical orbits. It orbits the Sun in theouter main-belt at a distance of 2.6–3.0 AU once every 4 years and 9 months (1,747 days). Its orbit has aneccentricity of 0.07 and aninclination of 3° with respect to theecliptic.[1]
Wiles'spectral type has been characterized as a LS-type, an intermediary between the commonstony and rather rareL-type asteroid.[8] Alternatively, and contrary to the body's determined albedo (see below), it is also considered to be a carbonaceousC-type asteroid.[9]
In early 2014, two rotationallightcurves ofWiles were obtained from photometric observations in the R-band at thePalomar Transient Factory in California. Lightcurve analysis gave arotation period of 3.47 and 3.482 hours with a brightness variation of 0.13 and 0.15magnitude (U=2/2).[6][7]
According to the survey carried out by NASA'sWide-field Infrared Survey Explorer with its subsequentNEOWISE mission,Wiles measures 7.148 kilometers in diameter and its surface has analbedo of 0.262,[4][5] while theCollaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for members of the Koronis family of 0.24, and calculates a diameter of 17.12 kilometers with anabsolute magnitude of 11.0.[3]
Thisminor planet was named after ofAndrew J. Wiles (born 1953), a British mathematician and professor at Princeton University, who is best known for provingFermat's Last Theorem in 1993.[2] The naming was proposed byLutz D. Schmadel, who also prepared the citation. It was published on 2 April 1999 (M.P.C. 34356).[2][12]
