PHY2100 Laboratory 1

ASTEROIDS
Are they a threat to Mankind?
June 30, 2008, was the 100th
anniversary of that ferocious
impact near the Podkamennaya
Tunguska River in remote Siberia
that left a region of scorched trees
about 50 kilometres (30 mi)
across. After 100 years, scientists
are still talking about it, still
uncertain what exactly happened.

On July 19th 2009 an amateur

astronomer in Murrumbateman
near Canberra discovered a dark
spot in the atmosphere of Jupiter.
Images taken by the Hubble
Space Telescope confirmed the
presence what appears to be an
asteroid or cometary impact
reminiscent of the ShoemakerLevy 9 impact that occurred in
July, 1994.

INTRODUCTION
Over 400,000 asteroids have been discovered since the first Asteroid Ceres
(pronounced sear-rees) was found by Giuseppe Piazzi on January the 1 st
1801.
Although most asteroids orbit the Sun between Mars and Jupiter, some
classified as Near Earth Objects (NEOs) pass close to or even cross
Earths orbital path around the Sun.
The capability of Earth based telescopes to detect these faint moving objects
in the night sky has increased dramatically in the past couple of decades (see
chart below). Occasionally newly discovered asteroids are found just before,
or most often after closest approach to Earth. Subsequent calculations
enable future encounters to be predicted well into the future.

So far only one Earth threatening candidate has been determined. Called
Apophis, it will miss Earth in 2029 by only ~20,000 km. but the next encounter
with Earth in 2036 is not predicted with good accuracy since the Earth will
have perturb the orbit significantly in the 2029 encounter.
This lab demonstrates the techniques that professional astronomers use to
detect asteroids and determine there orbits.
Extensions to this software are available that enable for amateur astronomers
to analyse there own telescopic images.

Homework
Find definitions for the following astronomical terms and write a short
summary (one or two lines).
Universal Time
Is time measured at Greenwich in England. It is a time scale that is based
upon the rotation of the earth compared to distant celestial objects.
Arc second
Is the angular measurement that is 1/360 of a degree. It is used in astronomy
to measure declination, or the angular distance north or south of the celestial
equator.
Right Ascension

Is the celestial equivalent of longitude. It is commonly expressed in both

degrees , hours, minutes and seconds of time. I.e. 15 degrees of sky rotation
is equivalent to one hour of RA.
Declination
Is the celestial spheres equivalent of latitude and it is expressed in degrees,
as is latitude. For DEC + and refer to the north and south, respectively. I.e.
North pole is +90 degrees and south pole is -90 degrees DEC.
Parallax
Is the change in displacement of an object when viewed along two different
lines of sight. It is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between
those two lines.
Albedo
Is the fraction of solar energy (shortwave radiation) reflected from an object
back into space. It is used as a measure of an objects reflectivity.
Magnitude
Eccentricity
Inclination
Perigee
Apogee
Perihelion
Aphelion
Semi-major Axis
Apollo Asteroids

LAB WORK
The computer simulation software needed to perform these tasks and the
instructions for operating it will be provided in the lab.

PART A
In this section we will
1. Identify an asteroid on several CCD frames
2. Perform a Reduction of Coordinates
3. Determine Orbital parameters
4. Confirmation the results with NASAs NEO site

PART B
In this section we will use Parallax to measure the distance to an asteroid