Discovered by Y. Väisälä MPC designation 2678 Aavasaksa Orbital period 1,242 days Orbits Sun Asteroid family Flora family Asteroid group Asteroid belt | Discovery date 24 February 1938 Minor planet category main-belt · Flora Discovered 24 February 1938 Discoverer Yrjö Väisälä Discovery site Iso-Heikkilä Observatory | |
Named after Aavasaksa
(hill in Finnish Lapland) Alternative names 1938 DF1 · 1952 KM
1955 DH · 1977 SX1
1979 FP2 · A916 WA | ||
2678 Aavasaksa, provisional designation 1938 DF1, is a stony Flora asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 8 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 24 February 1938, by Finnish astronomer Yrjö Väisälä at Turku Observatory in Southwest Finland.
The S-type asteroid is a member of the Flora family, one of the largest groups of stony asteroids in the main-belt. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.1–2.5 AU once every 3 years and 5 months (1,241 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.09 and an inclination of 3° with respect to the ecliptic. The first precovery was obtained at Bergedorf Observatory in 1916, extending the asteroid's observation arc by 22 years prior to its discovery.
In January 2009, a provisional and fragmentary photometric light-curve analysis performed at the U.S. Via Capote Observatory,California, gave it a somewhat longer than average rotation period of 24 hours with a brightness amplitude of 0.4 in magnitude (U=1). According to the survey carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's space-based Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the asteroid measures 8.4 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.28, while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes an albedo of 0.24, derived from the Flora family's largest member and namesake, 8 Flora, and calculates a diameter of 8.2 kilometers.
The minor planet is named after Aavasaksa, a sharp-edged hill in Finnish Lapland, just south of the Arctic Circle. The hill is located in the Tornio River Valley, after which the minor planet 1471 Tornio is named, and is often considered the southernmost point in Finland, where the natural phenomenon of the midnight sun is visible each June. Naming citation was published on 26 May 1983 (M.P.C. 7947).