(9770) Discovery Main-belt Asteroid
Discovered on 1 March 1993 by T. Urata at Oohira.
Discovery was the name of the spaceship in Arthur Clarke's novel and Stanley Kubrick's movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. It is also the name of one of NASA's Space Shuttles.Naming citation (19990928/MPCPages.arc), IAU / Minor Planet Center, via NASA/JPL
Where Discovery is today
Seen from above the solar system on 2026-10-14: Discovery is 2.47 au from the Sun and 2.03 au from Earth. Computed from JPL's orbital elements.
Facts
| Number | 9770 |
| Provisional designation | 1993 EE |
| Orbit class | Main-belt Asteroid |
| Diameter | 7.00 km (#7,641 largest of 17,440 named asteroids with a measured size) |
| Albedo | 0.0400 |
| Rotation period | 3.95 hours |
| Absolute magnitude (H) | 14.92 |
| Orbital period | 3.45 years |
| Semi-major axis | 2.28 au |
| Perihelion – aphelion | 1.95 – 2.62 au |
| Eccentricity | 0.147 |
| Inclination | 3.95° |
| Closest distance between its orbit and Earth's (MOID) | 0.948 au |
Data: NASA/JPL Small-Body Database and the IAU Minor Planet Center.
Also named after someone called Arthur
- (3769) Arthurmiller
- (4571) Grumiaux
- (4923) Clarke
- (6440) Ransome
- (7016) Conandoyle
- (9721) Doty
- (10448) Schawlow
- (11516) Arthurpage
- (11760) Auwers
- (11767) Milne
- (13927) Grundy
- (16755) Cayley
All asteroids named after someone called Arthur