Talk:Active asteroid

2011 CR42 Notes

• CBET 2823 weak cometary activity: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/comets-ml/message/18037
• Outer Main-belt Asteroid (3.2 AU < a < 4.6 AU) and has a 86 day observation arc: http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2011CR42

-- Kheider (talk) 16:40, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

70P/178P

Can someone clarify this article's content? Where do the standards for a main-belt comet come from? Is this an incomplete list? Just by these criteria, I know of two others that should be on the list: 70P/Kojima, which crosses Jupiter's orbit and Hug-Bell, which is entirely in the asteroid belt region. 71.12.171.24 04:04, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

It does need work. A really good explanation of various issues can be found at Henry Hsieh's webpage. Regarding 70P/Kojima and Hug-Bell, have a look at the right-hand diagram of orbital elements at the bottom of Hsieh's webpage. It's not enough to have a semi-major axis well within Jupiter's because lots of Jupiter family comets have this − small eccentricity (and presumably also inclination) is also needed to be in a typical main belt orbit. Deuar 16:31, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for clearing that up, I'll check out those links. Tiakalla 05:40, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Look at this diagram. Main belt zones are shown in orange, red and maroon. — Fjörgynn (talk) 06:53, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

P/2010 A2

The new nature article might me good enough to get P/2010 A2 off the list. Both groups identify it as an asteroid after a collision.--Stone (talk) 19:52, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I think it is better to use it as an example of a probably false detection. JPL is still listing it as an Encke-type Comet. -- Kheider (talk) 20:40, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

HST is from Johns Hopkins so APL so they will not likely change it until they have their article on the topic. --Stone (talk) 21:00, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

P/2010 A2 is not in the main belt. The classification as 'Main Belt Comet' is a pure technicality, see also Dave Jewitt's site where he describes it as merely 'empirical': http://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/mbc.html. -- Comet1979 (talk) 21:37, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

MBAs are defined as "Asteroids with orbital elements constrained by (2.0 AU < a < 3.2 AU; q > 1.666 AU)". -- Kheider (talk) 16:40, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Rotational shedding

I just wanted to note this: Jewitt: Newly discovered Main Belt Comet observed w/ HST. Coma is remarkably thin sheet--caused by rotational shedding? -- Kheider (talk) 16:43, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

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Spinout of active asteroid

See Draft:Active asteroid. Is this a justifiable spinout? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:50, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

??? Draft does not seem to appear any more. Article has not been spun out, eh? "Active asteroid" and "Main-Belt comet" are two different (though related) definitions and there is no reason two articles cannot coexist.129.2.89.212~2026-29147-94 (talk) 20:58, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

See Draft talk:Active asteroid#AfC comments, and the comments at Special:Diff/918810195, for why this was turned into a redirect. There was large overlap between the two articles, and "active asteroid" and "main-belt comet" considered synonyms. If you believe that this was in error then Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects is probably the best place to raise those concerns. Renerpho (talk) 21:48, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

I've moved the following comment here from Special:Diff/1354184617, where I removed it because that discussion had been closed. Renerpho (talk) 21:52, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

• I disagree with either step. 1) There is no "scarcity" of WP articles, thus any move to combine categories is solving a problem that does not exist.

• 2) You are not an expert- you are unaware that we use the term main-belt comet. Do not speak for us again.

• 129.2.89.212~2026-29147-94 (talk) 20:55, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

Requested move 18 January 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved as requested per the discussion below. Dekimasuよ! 16:20, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

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Main-belt comet → Active asteroid – This type of solar system body has been referred to more commonly as an "active asteroid" for several years now in the astronomy community. David Jewitt and Henry Hsieh are the two astronomers that originally coined the term "main-belt comet" in 2006, and they switched to using the term "active asteroid" as early as 2011. Furthermore, "main-belt comet" excludes objects such as 101955 Bennu, which has recently been classified as an active asteroid but is not in the main belt. As Jewitt says,

"The preferred term for these bodies is "Active Asteroids". Formerly, we called them "Main Belt Comets" but this was misinterpreted by many people to mean that the active objects are necessarily icy. In most cases, we don't know if they are icy. In some cases we know that they are not."

Yarnalgo _talk to me 21:33, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with the move to active asteroid as the term main-belt comet is not really used any more. -- Kheider (talk) 22:24, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The first active asteroid discovered is 7968 Elst–Pizarro.

The article states "The first active asteroid discovered is 7968 Elst–Pizarro. It was discovered (as an asteroid) in 1979...", but Ceres was the first asteroid over all to be discovered, in 1801. Might it be more accurate to say, "The first asteroid to be identified as active is 7968 Elst–Pizarro. It was discovered (as an asteroid) in 1979..."? Jyg (talk) 21:42, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Valuable content from abandoned draft

Prior to the move of this page from "Main-belt comet" to the current name in January 2020, there was a draft for an "Active asteroid" article that was relatively good quality, but which was never used because it had too many overlaps with the Main-belt comet article, and the author of the draft seems to have quit in frustration when this was pointed out. Such overlap is no longer an issue, and I think we could benefit from some of the content.

I am looking specifically at the sections "The problem of threshold detection", "Activity mechanisms", and "Meteoroids/meteorites".

With a little bit of cleanup, these could be valuable additions for aspects that are not yet well covered by the article. What do you think? Renerpho (talk) 17:40, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

Compare the previous discussion Talk:Active asteroid#Spinout of active asteroid, where the possibility of making use of the old draft was not considered. Renerpho (talk) 17:43, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

I have incorporated the material. Renerpho (talk) 03:33, 19 July 2026 (UTC)