Lightcurve Analysis of Four New Monolithic Fast-Rotating Asteroids

✍ Scribed by Robert J. Whiteley; David J. Tholen; Carl W. Hergenrother

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2002
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 313 KB
• Volume: 157
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0019-1035
• DOI: 10.1006/icar.2001.6796

✦ Synopsis

them well below the critical threshold for the rotation rate of strengthless prolate ellipsoids, as we demonstrate. These four objects join the five previously identified fast-rotating asteroids. The sharp segregation in spin rates between these nine objects and asteroids with more typical spin rates is somewhat puzzling. No observed objects larger than about 200 m spin with rates faster than the critical rate for strengthless prolate ellipsoids, while no objects smaller than 200 m have shown spin rates slower than this critical limit. We hypothesize that these small, fast-rotating objects are representative of the building blocks of the "rubble pile" asteroids and are in fact derived from impacts into already existing "rubble piles."