638 Moira, also known as A907 JG, is a

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 ...

orbiting the

Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

. First observed in 1906, 638 Moira was discovered to be an orbital body in 1907 by

Joel Hastings Metcalf Joel Hastings Metcalf (January 4, 1866 – February 23, 1925) was an American astronomer, humanitarian and Minister (Christianity), minister. Reverend Metcalf graduated from Harvard Divinity School in 1892. He served as a Unitarianism, Unitarian ...

Taunton Taunton () is the county town of Somerset, England. It is a market town and has a Minster (church), minster church. Its population in 2011 was 64,621. Its thousand-year history includes a 10th-century priory, monastic foundation, owned by the ...

, England. 638 Moira is a little over 59.5 km across and rotates once every 10 hours. Its farthest point from the sun is a little over 3au during its 4.5 year orbit, and it is classed as an

L-type asteroid L-type asteroids are relatively uncommon asteroids with a strongly reddish spectrum shortwards of 0.75 μm, and a featureless flat spectrum longwards of this. In comparison with the K-type, they exhibit a more reddish spectrum at visible wavelen ...

(SMASSII).

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* * Background asteroids Moira Moira Ch-type asteroids (SMASS) 19070505 {{beltasteroid-stub