28 Bellona

28 Bellona is a large main-belt asteroid. It was discovered by German astronomer R. Luther on March 1, 1854, and named after Bellōna, the Roman goddess of war; the name was chosen to mark the beginning of the Crimean War. Its historical symbol was Bellona's whip and spear; it was encoded in Unicode 17.0 as U+1CECE 𜻎 (File:Bellona symbol (fixed width).svg).<ref name=astunicode>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Unicode-1CEC0">Template:Cite web</ref>

Bellona is a stony (S-type) asteroid with a cross-section size of around 100–120 km. 28 Bellona is orbiting the Sun with a period of 4.63 years.

Bellona has been studied by radar.<ref name="detected">Template:Cite web</ref> Photometric observations of this asteroid at the Palmer Divide Observatory in Colorado Springs, Colorado in 2007 gave a light curve with a period of 15.707 ± 0.002 hours and a brightness variation of 0.27 ± 0.03 in magnitude. This report is in close agreement with a period estimate of 15.695 hours reported in 1983, and rejects a longer period of 16.523 hours reported in 1979.<ref name="Warner2007"/>

File:000028-asteroid shape model (28) Bellona.png

A three-dimensional model of 28 Bellona based on its light curve

External links

• Lightcurve plot of 28 Bellona, Palmer Divide Observatory, B. D. Warner (2007)
• Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info Template:Webarchive)
• Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books
• Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend
• Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000) – Minor Planet Center
• Template:AstDys
• Template:JPL small body