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Home » Note, Paper: Plenty Planet Pieces

Note, Paper: Plenty Planet Pieces

In Astronomical Journal, for July (vol 170 #1):

Xu, X. Wang, X. Muinonen, K. et al.  Photometric Analysis of Asteroids in the Phocaea Region  Art. 35  add3f4
Silber, E.A. Trigo-Rodríguez, J. M. Oseghae, I. et al.  Multiparameter Constraints on Empirical Infrasound Period-yield Relations for Bolides, and Implications for Planetary Defense  Art. 38  add47d

When an asteroid experiences a major impact, the pieces spray out, but only by a limited distance. This forms an asteroid family- a set of asteroids, in close orbits, and assumed close compositions. (25) Phocaea appears to have such a family. Xu et al. see what they can see on this (maybe) family. And yes, this is relevant- Phocaea is near an orbital resonance, which can destabilize asteroids and send them Earthward.

Earthward means, for gravel-sized pieces, a dramatic flameout in Earth’s upper atmosphere. For decades, we have used instruments to gain a better knowledge of these large meteors, tentatively connecting them to the asteroids that produced them. How good are our instruments? Silber et al. study the studies. In some cases, a meteor is detected by multiple instrument types- do they corroborate? 

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