5080 Oja

Orbit and classification

Oja is a member of the Flora family (402), a giant asteroid family and the largest family of stony asteroids in the main belt. It orbits the Sun in the inner main belt at a distance of 2.0–2.5 AU once every 3 years and 4 months (1,226 days; semi-major axis of 2.24 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.12 and an inclination of 5° with respect to the ecliptic.

On 29 September 1924, the asteroid was first observed as at Heidelberg Observatory, where the body's observation arc begins two days later on 1 October 1924.

Physical characteristics

Oja has been characterized as a common, stony S-type asteroid by Pan-STARRS's photometric survey, in line with the overall spectral type of the Flora family.

Rotation period

In January 2006, a rotational lightcurve of Oja was obtained from photometric observations by an international collaboration of astronomers including Petr Pravec at Ondřejov Observatory and Donald Pray at Carbuncle Hill Observatory . The consolidated lightcurve analysis gave a rotation period of 7.222 hours and a brightness variation between 0.31 and 0.39 magnitude (). The result supersedes a period of 7.7 hours obtained by the discoverer (Claes-Ingvar Lagerkvist) in March 1976 ().

Diameter and albedo

According to the survey carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Oja measures between 6.94 and 8.399 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo between 0.1573 and 0.31. The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link adopts an albedo of 0.1573 from Pravec's revised WISE data and uses a diameter of 8.38 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 13.01.

Naming

This minor planet was named after the Swedish astronomer of Estonian descent Tarmo Oja (born 1934), who was a professor in astronomy at Uppsala University and the director of the discovering Kvistaberg Station during 1970–1999. His research included the structure of galaxies and variable stars. The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 14 July 1992 (M.P.C. 20522).

Notes

References

References

1. "JPL Small-Body Database Browser: 5080 Oja (1976 EB)". [[Jet Propulsion Laboratory]].
2. "5080 Oja (1976 EB)". Minor Planet Center.
3. "MPC/MPO/MPS Archive". Minor Planet Center.
4. (August 2014). "Main-belt Asteroids with WISE/NEOWISE: Near-infrared Albedos". The Astrophysical Journal.
5. "Asteroid 5080 Oja – Nesvorny HCM Asteroid Families V3.0". Small Bodies Data Ferret.
6. (December 2014). "Asteroids IV".
7. "LCDB Data for (5080) Oja". Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB).
8. (September 2012). "Absolute magnitudes of asteroids and a revision of asteroid albedo estimates from WISE thermal observations". Icarus.
9. (November 2011). "NEOWISE Studies of Spectrophotometrically Classified Asteroids: Preliminary Results". The Astrophysical Journal.
10. (September 2016). "NEOWISE Reactivation Mission Year Two: Asteroid Diameters and Albedos". The Astronomical Journal.
11. Lagerkvist, C.-I.. (March 1978). "Photographic photometry of 110 main-belt asteroids". Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement Series.
12. (December 2006). "Lightcurve analysis of asteroids 53, 698, 1016, 1523, 1950, 4608, 5080 6170, 7760, 8213, 11271, 14257, 15350 and 17509". The Minor Planet Bulletin.
13. (November 2015). "Absolute magnitudes and slope parameters for 250,000 asteroids observed by Pan-STARRS PS1 - Preliminary results". Icarus.