102 Miriam

102 Miriam

Discovery
Discovered by	Christian Heinrich Friedrich Peters
Discovery site	Litchfield Observatory
Discovery date	August 22, 1868
Designations
MPC designation	102
Named after	Miriam
Minor planet category	main belt
Orbital characteristics
Epoch November 30, 2008
Aphelion	3.3332 AU
Perihelion	1.9929 AU
Semi-major axis	2.66303 AU
Eccentricity	0.251655
Orbital period	1587.31 days (4.35 years)
Mean anomaly	108.084°
Inclination	5.176°
Longitude of ascending node	210.916°
Argument of perihelion	147.441°
Physical characteristics
Dimensions	83.00 kilometres (51.57 mi) ± 1.9 kilometres (1.2 mi) Mean diameter
Rotation period	15.789 hours
Albedo	0.0507 ± 0.002
Spectral type	P (Tholen classification) C (SMASSII classification)
Absolute magnitude (H)	9.26

102 Miriam is a moderately large, very dark main belt asteroid. It was discovered by C. H. F. Peters on August 22, 1868, from the Litchfield Observatory.

Peters named the asteroid after Miriam, the sister of Moses in the Old Testament. This caused some controversy, because at the time, asteroids were expected to be named after mythological figures, and the devout would not regard Biblical figures as such. According to fellow astronomer Edward S. Holden, Peters deliberately chose a name from the Bible so as to annoy an overly pious theology professor of his acquaintance.

Photometric observations of this asteroid during 2007 at the Organ Mesa Observatory in Las Cruces, New Mexico, were used to create a light curve plot. This showed a rotation period of 23.613 ± 0.001 hours and a brightness variation of 0.12 ± 0.02 magnitude. The curve shows three maxima and minima during each cycle. This value for the period differs from the 15.789 hour estimate produced in a 2008 study.