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(7352) 1994 CO

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Discovered by
  
S. Ueda H. Kaneda

MPC designation
  
(7352) 1994 CO

Observation arc
  
28.24 yr (10,313 days)

Orbits
  
Sun

Asteroid group
  
Jupiter trojan

Discovery date
  
4 February 1994

Alternative names
  
1994 CO · 1991 VD3

Discovered
  
4 February 1994

Discovery site
  
Kushiro Observatory

Minor planet category
  
Jupiter trojan  (Trojan camp)

Discoverers
  
Hiroshi Kaneda, Seiji Ueda

(7352) 1994 CO is an exceptionally slow rotating carbonaceous Jupiter trojan from the Trojan camp, approximately 48 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 4 February 1994, by Japanese astronomers Seiji Ueda and Hiroshi Kaneda at Kushiro Observatory in Kushiro, Japan.

The dark C-type Jovian asteroid resides in Jupiter's L5 Lagrangian point (Trojan camp), which lies 60° behind the gas giant's orbit. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 4.9–5.3 AU once every 11 years and 8 months (4,250 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.04 and an inclination of 8° with respect to the ecliptic. The first precovery was taken at Palomar Observatory in 1988, extending the body's observation arc by 6 years prior to its discovery.

In October 2013, a rotational light-curve was obtained for this asteroid from photometric observations by American amateur astronomer Robert D. Stephens at the CS3–Trojan Station (U81) in Landers, California. It gave a well-defined, outstandingly long rotation period of 7002648000000000000♠648±3 hours with a brightness variation of 0.30 magnitude (U=3-). As of 2016, there are only about two dozens exceptionally slowly rotating objects known with periods longer than 600 hours.

According to the space-based surveys carried out by the Japanese Akari satellite and the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the asteroid measures 47.1 and 47.7 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.093 and 0.21, respectively. The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for carbonaceous asteroids of 0.057 and calculates a significantly larger diameter of 58.3 kilometers, based on an absolute magnitude of 9.9.

References

(7352) 1994 CO Wikipedia


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