Discovery date 24 September 1960 Minor planet category main-belt Discovered 24 September 1960 | Observation arc 53.81 yr (19654 days) Orbits Sun Asteroid group Asteroid belt | |
Alternative names 6066 P–L · 1963 DL1978 YA1 Discoverers Tom Gehrels, Cornelis Johannes van Houten, Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld | ||
2436 Hatshepsut, also designated 6066 P–L, is an asteroid from the asteroid belt, which was discovered by Cornelis van Houten, Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld and Tom Gehrels at Palomar on September 24, 1960. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.9–3.5 AU once every 5 years and 8 months. Its orbit is only slightly eccentric and not much inclined to the ecliptic. The asteroid rotates around its axis every 9 hours.
The designation P–L stands for Palomar–Leiden, named after Palomar Observatory and Leiden Observatory, which collaborated on the fruitful Palomar–Leiden survey in the 1960s. Gehrels used Palomar's Samuel Oschin telescope (also known as the 48-inch Schmidt Telescope), and shipped the photographic plates to Cornelis Johannes van Houten and Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld at Leiden Observatory. The trio are credited with several thousand asteroid discoveries.
It is named after the only female pharaoh to reign over ancient Egypt, Hatshepsut.