On the Naming of Asteroids

I found a portion of the article on "Asteroids" from Wikipedia quite interesting and amusing...

  Sources for Asteroid Names

  Meaning of Names

The first few asteroids were named after figures from Graeco-Roman mythology, but as such names started to dwindle the names of famous people, literary characters, discoverer's wives, children, and even television characters were used.

The first asteroid to be given a non-mythological name was 20 Massalia, named after the city of Marseilles. For some time only female (or feminized) names were used; Alexander von Humboldt was the first man to have an asteroid named after him, but his name was feminized to 54 Alexandra. This unspoken tradition lasted until 334 Chicago was named; even then, oddly feminised names show up in the list for years afterward.

As the number of asteroids began to run into the hundreds, and eventually the thousands, discoverers began to give them increasingly frivolous names. The first hints of this were 482 Petrina and 483 Seppina, named after the discoverer's pet dogs. However, there was little controversy about this until 1971, upon the naming of 2309 Mr. Spock (which was not even named after the Star Trek character, but after the discoverer's cat who supposedly bore a resemblance to him). Although the IAU subsequently banned pet names as sources, eccentric asteroid names are still being proposed and accepted, such as 4321 Zero, 6042 Cheshirecat, 9007 James Bond, 13579 Allodd, 24680 Alleven, or 26858 Misterrogers.


  Special Naming Rules

Asteroid naming is not always a free-for-all: there are some types of asteroid for which rules have developed about the sources of names. For instance Centaurs (asteroids orbiting between Saturn and Neptune) are all named after mythological centaurs, Trojans after heroes from the Trojan War, and trans-Neptunian objects after underworld spirits.

Another well-established rule is that comets are named after their discoverer(s), whereas asteroids are not. One way to "circumvent" this rule has been for astronomers to exchange the courtesy of naming their discoveries after each other. A particular exception to this rule is 96747 Crespodasilva, which was named after its discoverer, Lucy d'Escoffier Crespo da Silva, because she died shortly after the discovery, at age 22.[16][17] A few objects are also cross-listed as both comets and asteroids, such as 4015 Wilson-Harrington and 107P/Wilson-Harrington.

And here is an interesting article from 1998 on the naming of asteroids from a publication called "In Our Skies"...check them out online by Googling...there are a number of other readworthy articles posted there...note the highest number given
(8240) at the time of this relatively recent publication and then read below what number we are at now (I posted the relevant sections from the Wiki article) and you will probably be as amazed as I was! (The numbers indicate order of discovery, with Ceres being the first in this long sequence of asteroid discoveries. Actually, Ceres is now classified as a "minor planet.")

NAME THOSE ASTEROIDS!
(originally run February 13, 1998)

The first asteroid was discovered almost two centuries ago, on January 1, 1801, by the Italian astronomer Giuseppe Piazzi at Palermo Observatory in Sicily. In keeping with the then-current tradition of naming planetary bodies after figures from Roman mythology, Piazzi christened the new object Ceres, the Roman goddess of harvests (and the patron goddess of Sicily). Additional asteroids were discovered in subsequent years and these, too, were given names of various mythological figures.

By the latter years of the 19th Century several hundred asteroids had been discovered, and the astronomers of that era quickly came to the conclusion that there were far more asteroids than there were mythological names to go around. As a result, asteroids began to be named after their discoverers' family members (usually the wife, daughters, or mother, since almost all the astronomers of that era were male), after benefactors, after hometowns and institutions, and so on.

These days, with modern equipment and as a result of numerous search efforts, hundreds of asteroids are discovered every month. A significant percentage of these are followed for a fairly long period of time and/or they can be identified with asteroids detected sometime in the past. Once an asteroid has been observed sufficiently well so that it can have a precise orbit calculated and astronomers can be reasonably confident that it won't become "lost" it is assigned a permanent number (usually given in parentheses). Ceres, of course, is asteroid number (1); the highest-numbered asteroid as of this writing is (8240).

Once an asteroid has been numbered it can then be given a name. In keeping with tradition, the "privilege" of assigning a name is usually given to the object's discoverer, although any proposed name must be approved by a special committee of the International Astronomical Union. (There are a few rules and prohibitions which exist as a result of international agreement.) Many discoverers today continue to follow the century-old tradition of naming their discoveries after family members, friends, home regions, and so on.

There are some traditions which apply to asteroids in special types of orbits. For example, asteroids which come inside the orbit of the Earth are still usually named for characters from Greek mythology; examples include (1862) Apollo, (2101) Adonis, (4341) Poseidon and (5731) Zeus. A subset of these objects are those which actually have orbits smaller than that of the Earth; these are usually given names out of Egyptian mythology, for example, (2062) Aten and (3554) Amun. (One of these asteroids, number (2100), was discovered at the same time as the Camp David peace accords in 1978 and was accordingly given the name Ra-Shalom.) Asteroids which come near to, but don't cross, the Earth's orbit are often given names out of Aztez or Inca mythology, for example, (1915) Quetzalcoatl and (1980) Tezcatlipoca.

Several asteroids have been discovered which orbit the sun in the same orbit as the planet Jupiter, but well ahead of it or behind it in gravitationally stable points called "Lagrangian points." Such asteroids are collectively referred to as "Trojan" asteroids and are named after figures from the Trojan War; examples include (588) Achilles, (911) Agamemnon, and (1143) Odysseus. A few years ago the first known "Mars Trojan" was discovered, and its discoverers decided to start a new tradition by christening such objects after "expressions of joy;" this object was named (5261) Eureka.

Many of the names given to "ordinary" main-belt asteroids honor famous astronomers and other scientists; among these are (662) Newtonia (many of the early asteroid names were feminized), (1604) Tombaugh, (1991) Darwin, (2001) Einstein, (2074) Shoemaker, (2709) Sagan and (7495) Feynman. Amateur astronomers who have made significant contributions are also frequently honored, for example (3673) Levy, (5799) Brewington and (7086) Bopp.

Many asteroids are given names of various cultural icons. Writers are fairly common; for example, we have (2106) Hugo, (2984) Chaucer, (2985) Shakespeare, (4370) Dickens and (5231) Verne among "older" authors, and for those who look for more modern works, we have (2675) Tolkein, (4923) Clarke and (5020) Asimov.

Music is also very popular; (1034) Mozartia, (1814) Bach, (1815) Beethoven, (2055) Dvorak, (3784) Chopin and (4559) Strauss represent some of the "older" musicians found in the asteroid belt. Younger astronomers may appreciate the quartet (4147) Lennon, (4148) McCartney, (4149) Harrison and (4150) Starr, along with (3834) Zappafrank, (4305) Clapton and (4442) Garcia (from Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead). Those whose tastes don't quite tend towards rock 'n roll may prefer (6354) Vangelis or, possibly, (6433) Enya. Also orbiting the sun we find journalists such as (6318) Cronkite, entertainers like (3252) Johnny (from Johnny Carson), pioneers like (3895) Earhart, and sports heroes such as (6758) Jesseowens.

The namings of some asteroids are stories in their own right. (4105) Tsia, which this author had a role in naming, honors the state of New Mexico and its flag. ("Tsia" is the spelling of the flag's sun symbol in Keresan, the native language of the Zia pueblo.) (2309) Mr. Spock is named, not for the Star Trek character, but rather for the discoverer's cat who, like his namesake, is "imperturbable, logical, intelligent, and had pointed ears." And then there's the case of (3142) Kilopi, the story behind the naming of which is left as an exercise for the reader. (Hint: it's a very "circular" story . . . )

Oh, if anyone asks: there is indeed an asteroid (1024) Hale, although this object honors the early 20th Century astrophysicist George Ellery Hale (after whom the large telescope on Mount Palomar in California is also named) rather than this author. Not to worry, though, for there is also (4151) Alanhale, an object discovered in 1985 by the husband-and-wife team of Eugene and Carolyn Shoemaker. Someday, perhaps, a tourist resort in the asteroid belt . . .

Turns out 1998 was the cusp of the New Age of asteroid detection. Witness the following two sections from Wiki:

  Numbering

Asteroids are awarded with an official number once their orbits are confirmed. With the increasing rapidity of asteroid discovery, asteroids are currently being awarded six-figure numbers. The switch from five figures to six figures arrived with the publication of the Minor Planet Circular (MPC) of October 19, 2005, which saw the highest numbered asteroid jump from 99947 to 118161. This change caused a small "Y2k"-like crisis for various automated data services, since only five digits were allowed in most data formats for the asteroid number. Most services have now widened the asteroid number field. For those which did not, the problem has been addressed in some cases by having the leftmost digit (the ten-thousands place) use the alphabet as a digit extension. A=10, B=11,..., Z=35, a=36,..., z=61. A high number such as 120437 is thus cross-referenced as C0437 on some lists.

  Here's How the Number of Known/Named Asteroids Skyrocketed...

  Computerized methods

2004 FH is the centre dot being followed by the sequence; the object that flashes by during the clip is an artificial satellite. (Note: the previous sentence refers to a cool film of an asteroids movement you can see at the Wikipedia article.) There is increasing interest in identifying asteroids whose orbits cross Earth's, and that could, given enough time, collide with Earth (see Earth-crosser asteroids). The three most important groups of near-Earth asteroids are the Apollos, Amors, and Atens. Various asteroid deflection strategies have been proposed, as early as the 1960s.

The near-Earth asteroid 433 Eros had been discovered as long ago as 1898, and the 1930s brought a flurry of similar objects. In order of discovery, these were: 1221 Amor, 1862 Apollo, 2101 Adonis, and finally 69230 Hermes, which approached within 0.005 AU of the Earth in 1937. Astronomers began to realize the possibilities of Earth impact.

Two events in later decades increased the level of alarm: the increasing acceptance of Walter Alvarez' hypothesis that an impact event resulted in the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction, and the 1994 observation of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 crashing into Jupiter. The U.S. military also declassified the information that its military satellites, built to detect nuclear explosions, had detected hundreds of upper-atmosphere impacts by objects ranging from one to 10 metres across.

All of these considerations helped spur the launch of highly efficient automated systems that consist of Charge-Coupled Device (CCD) cameras and computers directly connected to telescopes. Since 1998, a large majority of the asteroids have been discovered by such automated systems. A list of teams using such automated systems includes:[13]

The Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) team
The Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) team
Spacewatch
The Lowell Observatory Near-Earth-Object Search (LONEOS) team
The Catalina Sky Survey (CSS)
The Campo Imperatore Near-Earth Objects Survey (CINEOS) team
The Japanese Spaceguard Association
The Asiago-DLR Asteroid Survey (ADAS)
The LINEAR system alone has discovered 84,764 asteroids, as of August 28, 2007.[14] Between all of the automated systems, 4711 near-Earth asteroids have been discovered[15] including over 600 more than 1 km in diameter.