National Central University (NCU) yesterday formally named a planetoid it discovered two years ago after Taiwan’s highest mountain.
The formal naming came after the school secured approval from the International Astronomical Union (IAU).
NCU vice president Liu Gin-rong (劉振榮) told a press conference that the IAU had passed the proposal to name the asteroid “Yushan.”
The asteroid is the first to be named after a Taiwanese mountain, in addition to its permanent serial number, No. 185546, given by the IAU’s Committee for Small Body Nomenclature.
Liu said the university chose the name “because our [Lulin] observatory is located on Yushan.”
“Over the years, Yushan National Park Headquarters has been very helpful to us. Since Yushan has taken care of us for 20 years and is competing in the [online competition for the] New Seven Wonders [of the natural world], we hope to make a contribution” by naming the planetoid “Yushan,” Liu said.
HEAVENLY YUSHAN
The research team at the Lulin observatory also estimated that the planetoid is similar in size to the 3,952m high Yushan.
The planetoid was discovered by Ye Quanzhi (葉泉志), a student at Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China, and Lin Chi-sheng (林啟生), an assistant at NCU’s Lulin Observatory, on Dec. 28, 2007.
TOP ASTEROID RESEARCH
The distance between the Earth and the asteroid is about 300 million kilometers. Its orbit passes between Mars and Jupiter and it can only be seen using a professional telescope.
Liu said the school launched a project to observe asteroids in 2006 and that the program had produced interesting results.
“Since we initiated the project, we have discovered about 800 planetoids in just a few years, which is very uncommon. This has made us the most active country in asteroid discovery,” Liu said.
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