(3443) Leetsungdao Mars-crossing Asteroid
Discovered on 26 September 1979 by Purple Mountain Observatory at Nanking.
Named in honor of the theoretical physicist Tsung-Dao Lee (b. 1926), professor at Columbia University, winner of the Nobel prize in physics in 1957. Among his outstanding works is the discovery of parity and other symmetry violations in weak interactions. From the late 1940s onward, he made many other landmark contributions to weak interactions. In the 1970s and 1980s Lee established the field of nontopological solitons and discovered a large class of new astronomical solutions of general relativity, called soliton stars.Naming citation (19960828/MPCPages.arc), IAU / Minor Planet Center, via NASA/JPL
Where Leetsungdao is today
Seen from above the solar system on 2026-10-14: Leetsungdao is 2.27 au from the Sun and 3.27 au from Earth. Computed from JPL's orbital elements.
Facts
| Number | 3443 |
| Provisional designation | 1979 SB1 |
| Orbit class | Mars-crossing Asteroid |
| Diameter | 8.85 km (#5,869 largest of 17,440 named asteroids with a measured size) |
| Albedo | 0.132 |
| Rotation period | 3.44 hours |
| Spectral type | T |
| Absolute magnitude (H) | 13.26 |
| Orbital period | 3.70 years |
| Semi-major axis | 2.39 au |
| Perihelion – aphelion | 1.66 – 3.13 au |
| Eccentricity | 0.308 |
| Inclination | 12.7° |
| Closest distance between its orbit and Earth's (MOID) | 0.689 au |
Data: NASA/JPL Small-Body Database and the IAU Minor Planet Center.