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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
Advances in IR detector technology, the increased availability of large aperture telescopes, and the techniques of Fourier transform spectroscopy (FTS) now permit IR (λ > 1μ) spectroscopic observations of asteroid surfaces. Asteroids already observed include Ceres, Vesta, and Eros. These initial results demonstrate that such studies can contribute new data concerning asteroid compositions. Some of the most diagnostic features of mineral spectra are in the IR spectral region, and for featureless spectra characterized only by slopes the extension of the spectral reflectivity curve into the IR provides tighter constraints on possible mineralogies. A systematic study of additional asteroids should exploit even further this new observational link to problems of meteorite origin and solar system evolution.