(4297) Eichhorn Main-belt Asteroid
Discovered on 19 April 1938 by W. Dieckvoss at Bergedorf.
Named in honor of Heinrich Karl Eichhorn (b. 1927), Austrian-American astronomer, educator and scholar, innovator in the astronomy of stellar positions and motions. He developed the central-overlap and other astrometric reduction methods that greatly improve their rigor, increasing the precision of stellar parallaxes and proper motions and thus also of the distance scale of the universe. Name proposed by A. R. Upgren.Naming citation (19961224/MPCPages.arc), IAU / Minor Planet Center, via NASA/JPL
Where Eichhorn is today
Seen from above the solar system on 2026-10-14: Eichhorn is 2.77 au from the Sun and 3.29 au from Earth. Computed from JPL's orbital elements.
Facts
| Number | 4297 |
| Provisional designation | 1938 HE |
| Orbit class | Main-belt Asteroid |
| Diameter | 3.67 km (#13,529 largest of 17,440 named asteroids with a measured size) |
| Albedo | 1.00 |
| Rotation period | 4.11 hours |
| Spectral type | Cb |
| Absolute magnitude (H) | 13.38 |
| Orbital period | 3.57 years |
| Semi-major axis | 2.34 au |
| Perihelion – aphelion | 1.89 – 2.79 au |
| Eccentricity | 0.192 |
| Inclination | 5.86° |
| Closest distance between its orbit and Earth's (MOID) | 0.872 au |
Data: NASA/JPL Small-Body Database and the IAU Minor Planet Center.
Also named after someone called Heinrich
- (3635) Kreutz
- (5762) Wanke
- (7873) Boll
- (8053) Kleist
- (8811) Waltherschmadel
- (9133) d'Arrest
- (10509) Heinrichkayser
- (15273) Ruhmkorff
- (15724) Zille
- (16761) Hertz
- (31032) Scheidemann
- (215868) Rohrer
All asteroids named after someone called Heinrich