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Asteroid Family Identification: History and State of the Art
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 March 2016
Abstract
The history of asteroid families, from their discovery back in 1918, until the present time, is briefly reviewed. Two threads have been followed: on the development of the theories of asteroid motion and the computation of proper elements, and on the methods of classification themselves. Three distinct periods can be distinguished: the first one until mid-1930s, devoted to discovery and first attempts towards understanding of the properties of families; the second one, until early 1980s, characterized by a growing understanding of their importance as key evidence of the collisional evolution; the third one, characterized by an explosion of work and results, comprises the contemporary era. An assessment is given of the state-of-the-art and possible directions for the future effort, focusing on the dynamical studies, and on improvements of classification methods to cope with ever increasing data set.
- Type
- Contributed Papers
- Information
- Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union , Volume 10 , Issue S318: Asteroids: New Observations, New Models , August 2015 , pp. 16 - 27
- Copyright
- Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2016
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