An asteroid discovered by two astronomers in 2008 has been named after Wu Ta-you (吳大猷) (1907-2000), an atomic and nuclear theoretical physicist known as the “father of contemporary Chinese physics.”
A ceremony was held yesterday at National Central University (NCU) in Taoyuan, in which Ip Wing-huen (葉永烜), a professor at NCU’s Graduate Institute of Astronomy, presented a certificate and a model of the planet Wutayou to the Taipei-based Wu Ta-you Foundation in honor of his extraordinary contributions to the development of science.
Chou Yi (周翊), the head of NCU’s Graduate Institute of Astronomy, said that naming the asteroid was a gesture of respect to the great physicist, who headed Taiwan’s top academic research institute, Academia Sinica, from 1983 to 1994.
According to NCU, the planet, with the code number 256892, was jointly discovered in February 2008 by astronomer Lin Chih-sheng (林啟生), who was stationed at the time at NCU’s Lulin Observatory on Yushan (玉山) in central Taiwan, and Ye Quanzhi (葉泉志), an astronomer at Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China.
It was not until June 15 last year that the Minor Planet Center of the International Astronomical Union approved the proposal to name the asteroid after the late physicist, NCU said.
Ip said Wutayou is situated in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. At present, it is close to Libra, he said.
He also said that Wutayou is one of more than 800 asteroids NCU has discovered from its Lulin Observatory. Citing the Minor Planet Center’s statistics, he said it showed that Lulin is one of the world’s most active observatories in terms of discovering celestial objects.
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