Euronear 2011

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Planetary and Space Science 56 (2008) 1913–1918
www.elsevier.com/locate/pss

EURONEAR: First results
O. Vaduvescua,c,Ã, M. Birlana, F. Colasa, A. Sonkab, A. Nedelcua,d
a

IMCCE, Observatoire de Paris, 77 Av. Denfert-Rochereau, 75014 Paris, France
‘‘Admiral Vasile Urseanu’’ Observatory, Lascar Catargiu 21, Bucharest, Romania
c
Institute of Astronomy, UniversidadCatolica del Norte, Avenida Angamos 0610, Antofagasta, Chile
d
The Astronomical Institute of the Romanian Academy, Cutitul de Argint 5, Bucharest, Romania
b

Accepted 5 February 2008
Available online 31 July 2008

Abstract
The European Near Earth Asteroid Research (EURONEAR) is a project which envisions to build a coordinated network which will
follow-up and recover potentially hazardousasteroids (PHAs) and near earth asteroids (NEAs). We aim to include in EURONEAR two
automated 1 m telescopes located in Chile and Europe, in addition to other non-permanent facilities. Astrometry will be the main aim of
the project in order to secure and follow-up newly discovered NEAs, also to recover PHAs at their second or following oppositions, while
photometry of bright PHAs will bringinformation on their physical properties. In this paper, first we review briefly the existent and past
NEAs programs. Next, we include the results obtained in 2006 from three observing runs at Pic du Midi using the 1 m telescope, HauteProvence employing the 1.2 m telescope, and Bucharest using a small 23 cm telescope. These add a total of 153 positions for 16 PHAs and
NEAs, which were accepted by MinorPlanet Center. Recently, a 1 m telescope was allocated by ESO in La Silla to be automated and
used as the Southern dedicated facility by EURONEAR.
r 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Keywords: Near earth asteroids (NEAs); Potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs); Astrometry; Follow-up; Photometry; Minor planet center

1. Introduction
Follow-up observations of near earth asteroids (NEAs)
arewelcomed by the astronomical community in order to
recover newly discovered bodies, to secure and improve
their orbits and to predict their future close encounters
with the Earth, including any possible collision threat well
in advance.
NEAs are defined as asteroids with a perihelion distance
qt1:3 AU (e.g., NASA, 2006a). Potentially hazardous
asteroids (PHAs) are defined as NEAs having a minimumorbital intersection distance ðMOIDÞt0:05 AU and the
absolute magnitudes H t22, which corresponds to objects
larger than about 150 m, assuming an albedo of 13%.
According to ASTORB database (Bowell, 2006), there
are 364,892 cataloged asteroids known today (11 January
2007). According to NEO website (NASA, 2006a), there
ÃCorresponding author.

E-mail addresses: ovidiu.vaduvescu@gmail.com(O. Vaduvescu),
mirel.birlan@imcce.fr (M. Birlan), francois.colas@imcce.fr (F. Colas).
0032-0633/$ - see front matter r 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
doi:10.1016/j.pss.2008.02.025

are 4414 NEAs and 837 PHAs known today (11 January
2007), and the number of known NEAs continues to grow
by 200–500 new NEAs and 50–90 new PHAs every year
(EARN, 2006). During the last decade, the numbers ofknown NEAs/PHAs have decreased dramatically, due to
five NEAs discovery programs in progress, mostly carried
out in the US: LINEAR (MIT, 2006), NEAT (NASA,
2006b), Spacewatch (LPL, 2006), LONEOS (Lowell, 1996),
and Catalina (Beshore et al., 2006).
Two important priorities after a NEA discovery consist
of the recovery and follow-up of the new object. Despite
the fast growth in the NEA number,very few groups
worldwide run dedicated astrometry programs. Some
notable efforts in the past were carried out at DAO in
Canada (Tatum et al., 1994), McDonald Observatory in
the US (Whipple, 1995), Beijing Observatory in China
(Zhu et al., 1997), AANEAS in Australia (Steel et al.,
1998), CINEOS in Italy (Boattini et al., 2004a), OCA-DLR
in France and Germany (ODAS, 1999), and others....