2021 RR205

2021 RR205
Discovery[1]
Discovered byS. S. Sheppard
D. J. Tholen
C. Trujillo
Discovery siteMauna Kea Obs.
Discovery date5 September 2021
Designations
2021 RR205
TNO[2] · detached · distant[3]
Orbital characteristics (barycentric)[4]
Epoch 25 February 2023 (JD 2460000.5)
Uncertainty parameter 3[2]
Observation arc5.11 yr (1,867 days)
Earliest precovery date24 July 2017
Aphelion1926 AU
Perihelion55.541 AU
990.9 AU
Eccentricity0.94395
31173 yr
0.363°
0° 0m 0.114s / day
Inclination7.644°
108.345°
208.574°
Physical characteristics
100–300 km (est. 0.04–0.2)[5]
24.6[1]
6.77±0.11[2] · 6.74[3]

2021 RR205 is an extreme trans-Neptunian object discovered by astronomers Scott Sheppard, David Tholen, and Chad Trujillo with the Subaru Telescope at Mauna Kea Observatory on 5 September 2021. It resides beyond the outer extent of the Kuiper belt on a distant and highly eccentric orbit detached from Neptune's gravitational influence, with a large perihelion distance of 55.5 astronomical units (AU).[4] Its large orbital semi-major axis (~1,000 AU) suggests it is potentially from the inner Oort cloud.[6][7] 2021 RR205 and 2013 SY99 both lie in the 50–75 AU perihelion gap that separates the detached objects from the more distant sednoids; dynamical studies indicate that such objects in the inner edge this gap weakly experience "diffusion", or inward orbital migration due to minuscule perturbations by Neptune.[6] While Sheppard considers 2021 RR205 a sednoid, researchers Yukun Huang and Brett Gladman do not.[8]

2021 RR205's heliocentric distance was 60 AU when it was discovered.[2] It has been detected in precovery observations by the Dark Energy Survey at Cerro Tololo Observatory from as early as July 2017.[3] It last passed perihelion in the early 1990s and is now moving outbound from the Sun.[1]

  1. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference MPEC-2022-S118 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b c d Cite error: The named reference jpldata was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference MPC-object was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference horizons-ssb was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference h was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Bannister2017 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference Sheppard-disc was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference Huang2024 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).