Newly Discovered Asteroid Comes Closer to the Sun than Mercury
takyon writes:
Newly Discovered Space Rock Loops The Sun Quicker Than Any Known Asteroid
A newly discovered asteroid has the second-shortest orbit that we know in the entire Solar System, pipped only by Mercury.
It's named 2021 PH27, and it takes just 113 days to complete a circuit around the Sun, on an unstable elliptical orbit that crosses the orbital paths of both Venus and Mercury.
This means that it comes extremely close to the Sun at its closest approach, or perihelion, skimming close enough to reach scorching temperatures up to 480 degrees Celsius (900 Fahrenheit).
[...] its size is roughly 1 kilometer (0.62 miles) across. We also know that, because it flies so close to the Sun, it experiences very strongly the effects of its gravitational field as described by General Relativity - in particular, the rotation of its orbit, a phenomenon known as apsidal precession.
Also at Carnegie Science.
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