1050 Meta, provisional designation , is a stony Eunomia asteroid from the central regions of the

asteroid belt The asteroid belt is a torus-shaped region in the Solar System, centered on the Sun and roughly spanning the space between the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Mars. It contains a great many solid, irregularly shaped bodies called asteroids ...

, approximately in diameter. It was discovered on 14 September 1925, by German astronomer Karl Reinmuth at the Heidelberg Observatory in southwest Germany. The meaning of the asteroids's name is unknown. The presumably S-type asteroid has a

rotation period In astronomy, the rotation period or spin period of a celestial object (e.g., star, planet, moon, asteroid) has two definitions. The first one corresponds to the '' sidereal rotation period'' (or ''sidereal day''), i.e., the time that the objec ...

of 6.14 hours and possibly an elongated shape.

Orbit and classification

''Meta'' is a member of the Eunomia family (), a prominent

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

of stony S-type asteroid and the largest one in the intermediate main belt with more than 5,000 members. It orbits the Sun in the central asteroid belt at a distance of 2.2–3.1 AU once every 4 years and 3 months (1,554 days;

semi-major axis In geometry, the major axis of an ellipse is its longest diameter: a line segment that runs through the center and both foci, with ends at the two most widely separated points of the perimeter. The semi-major axis (major semiaxis) is the longe ...

of 2.63 AU). Its orbit has an

eccentricity Eccentricity or eccentric may refer to: * Eccentricity (behavior), odd behavior on the part of a person, as opposed to being "normal" Mathematics, science and technology Mathematics * Off-Centre (geometry), center, in geometry * Eccentricity (g ...

of 0.18 and an

inclination Orbital inclination measures the tilt of an object's orbit around a celestial body. It is expressed as the angle between a reference plane and the orbital plane or axis of direction of the orbiting object. For a satellite orbiting the Eart ...

of 12 ° with respect to the

ecliptic The ecliptic or ecliptic plane is the orbital plane of Earth's orbit, Earth around the Sun. It was a central concept in a number of ancient sciences, providing the framework for key measurements in astronomy, astrology and calendar-making. Fr ...

. The body's

observation arc In observational astronomy, the observation arc (or arc length) of a Solar System body is the time period between its earliest and latest observations, used for tracing the body's path. It is usually given in days or years. The term is mostly use ...

begins with its first observation as at Heidelberg in October 1908, or 17 years prior to its official discovery observation.

Naming

Any reference of this

minor planet According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a minor planet is an astronomical object in direct orbit around the Sun that is exclusively classified as neither a planet nor a comet. Before 2006, the IAU officially used the term ''minor ...

's name to a person or occurrence is unknown.

Unknown meaning

Among the many thousands of named minor planets, ''Meta'' is one of 120 asteroids, for which no official naming citation has been published. All of these asteroids have low numbers between and and were discovered between 1876 and the 1930s, predominantly by astronomers

Auguste Charlois Auguste Honoré Charlois (; November 26, 1864 – March 26, 1910) was a French astronomer who discovered 99 asteroids while working at the Nice Observatory in southeastern France. Asteroid discovery His first discovery was the asteroid 267 Tirz ...

, Johann Palisa,

Max Wolf Maximilian Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf (21 June 1863 – 3 October 1932) was a German astronomer and a pioneer in the field of astrophotography. He was the chairman of astronomy at the University of Heidelberg and director of the Heidelberg-K� ...

and Karl Reinmuth.

Physical characteristics

According to the overall spectral type for members of the Eunomia family, ''Meta'' is an assumed S-type asteroid.

Rotation period and poles

In October 2006, a rotational

lightcurve In astronomy, a light curve is a graph (discrete mathematics), graph of the Radiance, light intensity of a celestial object or region as a function of time, typically with the magnitude (astronomy), magnitude of light received on the ''y''-axis ...

of ''Meta'' was obtained from photometric observations by French amateur astronomer René Roy. Lightcurve analysis gave a well-defined

of 6.142 hours with a brightness amplitude of 0.46 magnitude, indicating that the asteroid has an elongated shape (). A modeled lightcurve using photometric data from the Lowell Photometric Database was published in 2016. It gave a concurring period of 6.14188 hours, as well as two spin axes at (60.0°, −42.0°) and (198.0°, −79.0°) in ecliptic coordinates (λ, β).

Diameter and albedo

According to the surveys carried out by the Japanese Akari satellite and the

NEOWISE Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE, observatory code C51, Explorer 92 and MIDEX-6) was a NASA infrared astronomy space telescope in the Explorers Program launched in December 2009.. . WISE discovered thousands of minor planets and nu ...

mission of NASA's

Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE, List of observatory codes, observatory code C51, Explorer 92 and MIDEX-6) was a NASA infrared astronomy Space observatory, space telescope in the Explorers Program launched in December 2009.. . WISE L ...

, ''Meta'' measures between 8.773 and 10.03 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an

albedo Albedo ( ; ) is the fraction of sunlight that is Diffuse reflection, diffusely reflected by a body. It is measured on a scale from 0 (corresponding to a black body that absorbs all incident radiation) to 1 (corresponding to a body that reflects ...

between 0.294 and 0.364. The ''Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link'' assumes an albedo of 0.21 – derived from 15 Eunomia, the namesake and parent body of the Eunomia family – and calculates a diameter of 10.53 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 12.2.

References

External links

Lightcurve Database Query
(LCDB), at ''www.minorplanet.info''
Dictionary of Minor Planet Names
Google books

– ''Geneva Observatory'', Raoul Behrend
Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000)
– Minor Planet Center * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Meta 001050 Discoveries by Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth Named minor planets 19250914