Minor planet category Main belt Aphelion 2.4832 AU (371.48 Gm) Discovered 11 September 1891 | Discovery date 11 September 1891 Observation arc 124.03 yr (45302 d) Perihelion 2.0901 AU (312.67 Gm) Orbits Sun Asteroid group Asteroid belt | |
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Similar 441 Bathilde, 283 Emma, 272 Antonia, 302 Clarissa, 360 Carlova | ||
317 Roxane is an asteroid from the asteroid belt approximately 19 km in diameter. It was discovered by Auguste Charlois from Nice on September 11, 1891. The name was chosen by F. Bidschof, an assistant at the Vienna Observatory, at Charlois's request; Bidschof chose to name it after Roxana, the wife of Alexander the Great, and at first used the spelling Roxana.
In 2008, a team identified Roxane as the closest known spectroscopic match for the Peña Blanca Spring meteorite that landed in a swimming pool in Texas in 1946. There is a possibility, therefore, that 317 Roxane is from the same parent object as this meteorite.
In 2009, a team using the Gemini-North adaptive optics telescope discovered a moon orbiting Roxane. The moon is provisionally named S/2009 (317) 1. It measures 5 km in diameter and orbits 245 km from Roxane, completing one orbit every 13 days.