Discovery of the Bright Trans-Neptunian Object 2000 EB173 Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • We describe the discovery circumstances and photometric properties of 2000 EB173, now one of the brightest trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) with opposition magnitude mR = 18.9 and also one of the largest Plutinos, found with the drift-scanning camera of the Quasar Equatorial Survey Team, attached to the 1 m Schmidt telescope of the National Observatory of Venezuela. We measure B-V = 0.99 0.14 and V-R = 0.57 0.05, a red color observed for many fainter TNOs. At our magnitude limit mK = 20.1 0.20, our single detection reveals a sky density of 0.015+0.034-0.012 TNOs per square degree (the error bars are 68% confidence limits), consistent with fainter surveys showing a cumulative number proportional to 100.5mR. Assuming an inclination distribution of TNOs with FWHM exceeding 30, it is likely that 100 to several hundred objects brighter than mR = 20.1 remain to be discovered.

published proceedings

  • The Astrophysical Journal

author list (cited authors)

  • Ferrin, I., Rabinowitz, D., Schaefer, B., Snyder, J., Ellman, N., Vicente, B., ... Lawrence, K.

citation count

  • 17

complete list of authors

  • Ferrin, Ignacio||Rabinowitz, D||Schaefer, B||Snyder, J||Ellman, N||Vicente, B||Rengstorf, A||Depoy, D||Salim, S||Andrews, P||Bailyn, C||Baltay, C||Briceno, C||Coppi, P||Deng, M||Emmet, W||Oemler, A||Sabbey, C||Shin, J||Sofia, S||van Altena, W||Vivas, K||Abad, C||Bongiovanni, A||Bruzual, G||Della Prugna, F||Herrera, D||Magris, G||Mateu, J||Pacheco, R||Sánchez, Ge||Sánchez, Gu||Schenner, H||Stock, J||Vieira, K||Fuenmayor, F||Hernandez, J||Naranjo, O||Rosenzweig, P||Secco, C||Spavieri, G||Gebhard, M||Honeycutt, K||Mufson, S||Musser, J||Pravdo, S||Helin, E||Lawrence, K

publication date

  • February 2001