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Asteroids are small, planet-like bodies that are part of our solar system. Most asteroids have orbits between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, but some are found at other places of the solar system, sometimes having orbits that come close to the Earth's orbit. A second group of asteroids, called the Kuiper Belt, has in recent times been discovered outside the orbit of Neptune. Some astronomers consider Pluto to be an asteroid from the Kuiper Belt rather than a full-blown planet. Would like to call this into serious question. There's a second belt, of course, but I don't think the word asteroid is ever applied to them. They're icy rather than rocky debris; comet is by and large a better term. Maybe AstroNomer could confirm this one way or another? The largest asteroid is Ceres with a diameter of 1003 km. It also was the first to be discovered by [Giuseppe Piazzi]? on January 1, 1801. Nowadays, over 9000 asteroids are known, some less than 1 km across. Two other large asteroids are Pallas? and Vesta?. The first nearby pictures of an asteroid were taken by the Galileo spacecraft of Gaspra? and Ida? in 1991, while [NEAR Shoemaker]? landed on Eros? in 2001. |
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See also Asteroid. |
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