Main-belt asteroid
331 Etheridgea is a largemain belt asteroid .[ 1] It was discovered byAuguste Charlois on 1 April 1892 inNice . The meaning of the name is unknown.[ 2] This asteroid is orbiting theSun at a distance of 3.02 AU with aperiod of 5.26 years and aneccentricity (ovalness) of 0.10. Theorbital plane is tilted at an angle of 6.05° to theplane of the ecliptic .[ 1]
Analysis of the asteroidlight curve generated fromphotometric data collected in 2015 provided arotation period of 25.315± 0.001 h . This result is completely different from the previous rotation period estimates.[ 3] It is a lowalbedo ,carbonaceous C-type asteroid and spans a girth of 74.9± 2.7 km .[ 4]
It may have been named for the geologist and paleontologistRobert Etheridge (1819–1903).[ 5] [ 6]
^a b c "331 Etheridgea" .JPL Small-Body Database .NASA /Jet Propulsion Laboratory . Retrieved11 May 2016 .^ Schmadel, Lutz D. (2009),Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Addendum to Fifth Edition: 2006 - 2008 , Springer, p. 217,ISBN 9783642019654 ^ Pilcher, Frederick (April 2016), "Rotation Period Determination for 269 Justitia, 275 Sapientia 331 Etheridgea, and 609 Fulvia",Bulletin of the Minor Planets Section of the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers ,43 (2):135– 136,Bibcode :2016MPBu...43..135P . ^ Fornasier, S.; et al. (2014), "Aqueous alteration on main belt primitive asteroids: Results from visible spectroscopy",Icarus ,233 :163– 178,arXiv :1402.0175 ,Bibcode :2014Icar..233..163F ,doi :10.1016/j.icarus.2014.01.040 . ^ "April 01 – Discovery of Asteroid 331 Etheridgea (1892)" . 1 April 2020.^ Room, A. (1988). Dictionary of Astronomical Names . United Kingdom: Routledge.