(11517) Esteracuna Main-belt Asteroid
Discovered on 12 March 1991 by H. Debehogne at La Silla.
Maria Ester Acuna Castillo (b. 1951) was a caretaker at the Manuel Foster Observatory for several decades. She assisted astronomers during observations with the historical single-prism spectrograph mounted on a replica of the Lick Observatory telescope on Cerro San Cristobal in the heart of Santiago de Chile.Naming citation (20110715/MPCPages.arc), IAU / Minor Planet Center, via NASA/JPL
Where Esteracuna is today
Seen from above the solar system on 2026-10-14: Esteracuna is 3.51 au from the Sun and 3.38 au from Earth. Computed from JPL's orbital elements.
Facts
| Number | 11517 |
| Provisional designation | 1991 EA4 |
| Orbit class | Main-belt Asteroid |
| Diameter | 10.5 km (#4,843 largest of 17,440 named asteroids with a measured size) |
| Albedo | 0.0700 |
| Rotation period | 19.2 hours |
| Absolute magnitude (H) | 13.45 |
| Orbital period | 5.52 years |
| Semi-major axis | 3.12 au |
| Perihelion – aphelion | 2.69 – 3.55 au |
| Eccentricity | 0.137 |
| Inclination | 0.577° |
| Closest distance between its orbit and Earth's (MOID) | 1.71 au |
Data: NASA/JPL Small-Body Database and the IAU Minor Planet Center.
Also named after someone called Maria
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- (7722) Firneis
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- (9815) Mariakirch
- (9822) Hajdukova
- (10924) Mariagriffin
- (12005) Delgiudice
- (12624) Mariacunitia
- (13760) Rodriguez
- (14230) Mariahines
All asteroids named after someone called Maria