The Minor Planet Center has wasted no time in assigning minor planet numbers to Pluto, 2003 UB313, and other Kuiper Belt Objects.
(134340) Pluto
Additional identifications = Object Lowell Observatory = X
(136199) 2003 UB313
(136472) 2005 FY9
(136108) 2003 EL61
etc...
Minor Planet Designations
Andrew Lowe over at the Minor Planet Mailing List figured this out.
A tradition in the minor planets was to name the "special" numbers after something special: (8000) Isaac Newton, (20000) Varuna, (50000) Quaoar, etc. A great opportunity was lost when (100000) wasn't designated as Pluto.
2 comments:
And (136108) 2003 EL61 was attributed to the Spanish team, to to M. Brown et al.
I think we've gotten to the point where the number is harder to remember than the provisional designation:-p
If they re-name the Minor Planet Center to be the Small Solar System Bodies Center, they're going to create an anomoly out of (4999) MPC = 1987 CJ (= 1966 CZ).
The MPC has been tight on the columns for the submission reports so they write 136108 as D6108.
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