Discovered by S. Arend MPC designation 1683 Castafiore Discovered 19 September 1950 Orbits Sun Asteroid group Asteroid belt | Discovery date 19 September 1950 Minor planet category main-belt · (middle) Absolute magnitude 11.6 | |
Alternative names 1950 SL · 1936 PH1949 HA · 1959 TH People also search for 1652 Hergé, Sun, 1579 Herrick | ||
1683 Castafiore, provisional designation 1950 SL, is a carbonaceous asteroid from the middle region of the asteroid belt, approximately 21 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 19 September 1950, by Belgian astronomer Sylvain Arend at Royal Observatory of Belgium in Uccle, Belgium.
The C-type asteroid orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.3–3.2 AU once every 4 years and 6 months (1,654 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.18 and an inclination of 12° with respect to the ecliptic.
In September 2004, American astronomer Donald P. Pray obtained a rotational light-curve of Castafiore from photometric observations. It gave a rotation period of 13.931 hours with a brightness variation of 0.66 magnitude (U=2+).
According to the survey carried out by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer with its subsequent NEOWISE mission, Castafiore measures 21.15 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.160 (best result only), while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for carbonaceous asteroids of 0.057 and calculates a diameter of 25.44 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 11.7.
This minor planet is named for Bianca Castafiore, a fictional character in the comic-strip Adventures of Tintin . On the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday, the father of the fictional character, Georges Remi, better known under his pseudonym Hergé, was honoured by the minor planet 1652 Hergé. Naming citation was published on 8 April 1982 (M.P.C. 6832).