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The largest asteroids with an accurately measured mass, because they have been studied by the probe Dawn, are 1 Ceres with a mass of (939.3 ± 0.5) × 10 18 kg, and 4 Vesta at (259.076 ± 0.001) × 10 18 kg. The third-largest asteroid with an accurately measured mass, because it has moons, is 87 Sylvia at (14.76 ± 0.06) × 10 18 kg.
This asteroid belt is also called the main asteroid belt or main belt to distinguish it from other asteroid populations in the Solar System. [ 1 ] The asteroid belt is the smallest and innermost known circumstellar disc in the Solar System.
Main-belt asteroids have orbital elements constrained by (2.0 AU < a < 3.2 AU; q > 1.666 AU) according to JPL Solar System Dynamics (JPLSSD). [98] Many TNOs are omitted from this list as their sizes are poorly known.
The asteroid and comet belts orbit the Sun from the inner rocky planets into outer parts of the Solar System, interstellar space. [16] [17] [18] An astronomical unit, or AU, is the distance from Earth to the Sun, which is approximately 150 billion meters (93 million miles). [19]
The largest object in the asteroid belt, the dwarf planet Ceres, is an icy body that measures 592 miles across. About 25% of its mass, NASA estimates , is made up of water.
Ceres to scale among the Inner Solar System planetary-mass objects beside the Sun, arranged by the order of their orbits outward from the Sun (from left: Mercury, Venus, Earth, the Moon, Mars and Ceres) Ceres is the largest asteroid in the main asteroid belt. [16]
In the main asteroid belt, there appear to be two primary populations of asteroid: a dark, volatile-rich population, consisting of the C-type and P-type asteroids, with albedos less than 0.10 and densities under 2.2 g/cm 3, and a dense, volatile-poor population, consisting of the S-type and M-type asteroids, with albedos over 0.15 and densities ...
This is a secondary asteroid belt in the Solar System surrounding the path followed by the Earth-Moon system. In some previous cases, asteroids anticipated to become Earth’s mini-moons have ...