1973 NA is a possible parent body of the Quadrantids, a major meteor shower that occurs every January. It may also be just a fragment of the parent or the dormant remains of the parent. Other possible parent bodies are Comet 1491 I and comet 96P/Machholz,[5] as well as (196256) 2003 EH1.[6][7]
Orbit and classification
The asteroid orbits the Sun at a distance of 0.9–4.0 AU once every 3 years and 10 months (1,388 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.64 and an inclination of 68° with respect to the ecliptic.[1] No precoveries were taken. The asteroid's observation arc even begins 2 days after its discovery.[2]
The body was also one of the first known near-Earth asteroids. Its discovery happened just two days after it had passed 0.07984 AU (11,900,000 km) from Earth on one of its closest approaches ever computed.[8] It was then tracked for more than a month, but was not seen again until its next close approach in 1992, when it was recovered by the Siding Spring Observatory in Australia.[2] Its minimum orbit intersection distance with Earth is now 0.0904 AU (13,500,000 km).[1]
Physical characteristics
The stony S-type asteroid is also classified as a transitional C/X-type according to observations by the NASA IRTF telescope.[4] A rotational lightcurve for this asteroid was obtained by American astronomer Brian Skiff from photometric observations made in June 2011. Lightcurve analysis gave a well-defined rotation period of 2.855±0.001 hours with a brightness variation of 0.15 magnitude (U=3).[a] The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for stony asteroids of 0.20 and calculates a diameter of 1.88 kilometers with an absolute magnitude of 16.0.[3]
^Porubcan, V.; Kornos, L. (February 2005). "The Quadrantid meteor stream and 2003 EH1". Contributions of the Astronomical Observatory Skalnaté Pleso. 35 (1): 5–16.(CoSkaHomepage). Bibcode:2005CoSka..35....5P.
