California (minor planet designation: 341 California) is an asteroid belonging to the Flora family in the Main Belt. It was discovered by Max Wolf on 25 September 1892 in Heidelberg, and is named for the U.S. state of California.[5] This object is orbiting the Sun at a distance of 2.20 AU with a period of 3.26 yr and an eccentricity (ovalness) of 0.19. The orbital plane is inclined at an angle of 5.7° to the plane of the ecliptic.[1]
Discovery | |
---|---|
Discovered by | Max Wolf |
Discovery site | Heidelberg Obs. |
Discovery date | 25 September 1892 |
Designations | |
(341) California | |
Named after | California |
1892 J; 1979 FY2 | |
Main belt | |
Orbital characteristics [1] | |
Epoch 31 July 2016 (JD 2457600.5) | |
Uncertainty parameter 0 | |
Observation arc | 113.45 yr (41,439 d) |
Aphelion | 2.62698 AU (392.991 Gm) |
Perihelion | 1.77187 AU (265.068 Gm) |
2.19943 AU (329.030 Gm) | |
Eccentricity | 0.19439 |
3.26 yr (1,191.4 d) | |
15.6325° | |
0° 18m 7.783s / day | |
Inclination | 5.66900° |
29.0469° | |
293.875° | |
Physical characteristics | |
Dimensions | 14.67±0.9 km [1] 15 km [2] |
Mean density | ~2.7 g/cm3[3] |
317.88 h (13.25 d) | |
0.4950±0.064 [1] 0.495 [2] | |
S [4] | |
Flora family | |
10.55 | |
The very slow rotation rate of this asteroid favors collecting photometric data for an extended period in order to measure the period. Data collected from June to December 2016 was used to produce a light curve showing a rotation period of 317.88±0.06 h with a brightness variation of 0.9 in magnitude. It is tumbling with a period of 250±2 h.[6] It has an unusually high albedo.