12359 Cajigal
asteroid
12359 Cajigal, provisional designation 1993 SN3, is a carbonaceous Themistian asteroid from the outer region of the asteroid belt, approximately 12 kilometers in diameter.
The asteroid was discovered on 22 September 1993, by Venezuelan astronomer Orlando Naranjo at the Llano del Hato National Astronomical Observatory, Mérida, located in the Venezuelan Andes. It was named after Venezuelan politician and scientist Juan Manuel Cajigal y Odoardo.
Orbit and classification
Cajigal is a member of the Themis family, a dynamical family of outer-belt asteroids with nearly coplanar ecliptical orbits. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.7–3.7 AU once every 5 years and 9 months (2,091 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.16 and an inclination of 1° with respect to the ecliptic.
In October 1976, t was first observed as 1976 UU2 at Crimea–Nauchnij. The body's observation arc begins 2 years prior to its official discovery observation, with a precovery taken at Steward Observatory (Kitt Peak–Spacewatch) in June 1991.
Physical characteristics
Lightcurve
In September 2010, a photometric lightcurve of Cajigal obtained in the R-band by astronomers at the Palomar Transient Factory in California, gave a rotation period of 11.7664 hours with a brightness variation of 0.27 magnitude (U=2).
Diameter and albedo
According to the survey carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Cajigal measures 11.69 and 13.052 kilometers in diameter, and its surface has an albedo of 0.098 and 0.095, respectively.
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This entry incorporates text from “12359 Cajigal” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.