Journal
ICARUS
Volume 266, Issue -, Pages 57-75Publisher
ACADEMIC PRESS INC ELSEVIER SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1016/j.icarus.2015.11.014
Keywords
Asteroids Asteroids; composition Spectroscopy Asteroids; dynamics Origin; Solar System Near-Earth objects
Categories
Funding
- Insituto de Astrofisica de Canarias
- MINECO, Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness [AYA2012-39115-C03-03, ESP2013-47816-C4-2-P]
- 'Gaia Research for European Astronomy Training' (GREAT) of the ESF Research Networking Programmes
- Action Specifique GAIA
- ANR-project Shocks
- NASA's Near-Earth Object Observations program
- Center for Lunar and Asteroid Surface Science - NASA's SSERVI program at the University of Central Florida
- European Science Foundation's Gaia Research for European Astronomy Training
- Centre National d'Etude Spatiaux (CNES)
- I-SET, a NASA SSERVI program at SwRI
- NASA [NNM10AA11C, NNX12AL26G]
- ESO program [185.C-1033(H)]
- Florida Space Grant Consortium through NASA [NNX10AM01H]
- NASA [NNX10AM01H, NNX12AL26G, 43766, 129392] Funding Source: Federal RePORTER
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The Polana-Eulalia family complex is located in the inner part of the asteroid belt, bounded by the nu(6) and the 3:1 resonances, where we can find another three collisional families of primitive asteroids (Erigone, Clarissa, and Sulamitis), and a low-albedo population of background objects. This region of the belt is believed to be the most likely origin of the two primitive near-Earth asteroids that are the current targets of two sample return missions: NASA's OSIRIS-REx and JAXA's Hayabusa 2 to Asteroids (101955) Bennu and (162173) Ryugu (also known as 1999 JU(3)), respectively. Therefore, understanding these families will enhance the scientific return of these missions. We present the results of a spectroscopic survey of asteroids in the region of the Polana-Eulalia family complex, and also asteroids from the background population of low-albedo, low-inclination objects. We obtained visible spectra of a total of 65 asteroids, using the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) and the 3.6 m Telescopio Nazionale Galileo (TNG), both located at the El Roque de Los Muchachos Observatory, in the island of La Palma (Spain), and the 3.6 m New Technology Telescope (NTT), located at the European Southern Observatory of La Silla, in Chile. From the spectral analysis of our sample we found that, in spite of the presence of distinct dynamical groups, the asteroids in this region present spectral homogeneity at visible wavelengths, showing a continuum of spectral slopes, from blue to moderately red, typical of primitive asteroids classified as B- and C-types. We conclude that visible spectra cannot be used to distinguish between members of the Polana and the Eulalia families, or members of the background population. The visible spectra of the two targets of sample return missions, Asteroids Bennu and Ryugu, are compatible with the spectra of the asteroids in this region, supporting previous studies that suggested either the Polana family or the background population as the most likely origins of these NEAs. (c) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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