Discovered by E. Bowell MPC designation 3277 Aaronson Observation arc 54.75 yr (19,998 days) Discovered 8 January 1984 Orbits Sun | Discovery date 8 January 1984 Minor planet category main-belt · (outer) Orbital period 2,034 days Aphelion 3.99 m Discoverer Edward L. G. Bowell | |
Alternative names 1984 AF1 · 1962 CF1971 UV2 · 1982 TU2 | ||
3277 Aaronson, provisional designation 1984 AF1, is a carbonaceous asteroid from the outer region of the asteroid belt, approximately 20 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered by American astronomer Edward Bowell at Lowell's Anderson Mesa Station, near Flagstaff, Arizona, on 8 January 1984.
The C-type asteroid orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.3–4.0 AU once every 5 years and 7 months (2,034 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.27 and an inclination of 9° with respect to the ecliptic. The first precovery was obtained at Goethe Link Observatory in 1962, extending the asteroid's observation arc by 22 years prior to its discovery.
In November 2010, a rotational light-curve for this asteroid was obtained from photometric observations made at the U.S. Shadowbox Observatory in Carmel, Indiana. It rendered a rotation period of 7000980000000000000♠9.80±0.05 hours with a brightness amplitude of 0.14 in magnitude (U=2+).
Based on NASA's space-based WISE and its subsequent NEOWISE mission, the asteroid has an albedo of 0.11 and 0.12, and a diameter of 19.9 and 20.0 kilometers, respectively, while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link (CALL) assumes a lower albedo of 0.06, which translates into a larger diameter of 26.6 kilometers, as the lower the albedo (reflectivity), the higher the body's diameter, for a given absolute magnitude (brightness).
The minor planet was named in memory of American astronomer Marc Aaronson (1950–1987), killed in the dome of the 4-meter Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope of the Kitt Peak National Observatory. His fields of research included the detection the decelerative effect of the Virgo cluster on the Hubble flow, observations of carbon stars in the globular clusters in the Magellanic clouds, and measurement of the large velocity dispersion in dwarf spheroidal galaxies, suggesting that all galaxies do have dark matter halos. Naming citation was published on 11 July 1987 (M.P.C. 12016).