File:40_Harmonia.png · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons
Picture of the Day · NASA
Pathfinder on Mars
2026-07-04
On July 4th, 1997, using its own array of fireworks, a parachute, and a cocoon of airbags, the Mars Pathfinder spacecraft bounced like a giant beach ball at least 15 times before it came to rest on the surface of Mars at 10:07 AM Pacific Daylight Time. After its then novel airbag-assisted landing sequence was completed, Pathfinder transmitted this color mosaic to mission operators on Earth. In the scene from another world, the Mars Sojourner robot rover is visible in the foreground, crouched on top of the unfolded Pathfinder. About the size of a large house cat, the six-wheeled, solar-powered Sojourner became the first successful Martian rover. Surrounding Pathfinder are deflated airbags and the rock-strewn terrain of the Ares Vallis floodplain. In the distance Martian hills appear against a dusty brownish sky. The Pathfinder lander was subsequently renamed the Carl Sagan Memorial Station.
via NASA APOD
Key facts
- Discovered by
- H. Goldschmidt
- Discovery date
- March 31, 1856
- Pronunciation
- / h ɑːr ˈ m oʊ n i ə /
- Named after
- Harmonia
- Alternative designations
- 1950 XU
- Minor planet category
- Main belt
- Aphelion
- 355.021 million km (2.373 AU )
- Perihelion
- 323.537 million km (2.163 AU)
- Semi major axis
- 339.279 million km (2.268 AU)
- Orbital period sidereal
- 1,247.514 d (3.42 a )
- Mean anomaly
- 249.120°
- Inclination
- 4.256°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 94.287°
- Argument of perihelion
- 268.988°
- Dimensions
- 111.251 ± 0.391 km
- Mass
- (2.206 ± 0.612/0.42) × 10 kg
- Mean density
- 2.867 ± 0.795/0.546 g/cm
- Synodic rotation period
- 0.3712 d (8.909 h)
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Diameter
- 111.251
- Mass
- 1.3
- Orbital period
- 1247.440820646665
- Image
- 40Harmonia (Lightcurve Inversion).png
Show 15 more facts
- provisional designation
- A856 FA
- time of discovery or invention
- 1856-03-31
- orbital inclination
- 4.255751120536998
- albedo
- 0.22
- Commons category
- 40 Harmonia
- absolute magnitude
- 6.55
- rotation period
- 8.91
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.04628937366727781
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 2.267850123869464
- periapsis
- 2.162872762064288
- apoapsis
- 2.37282748567464
- longitude of ascending node
- 94.15652380785309
- argument of periapsis
- 269.8432694647803
- mean anomaly
- 80.29463393086527
- time of periapsis
- 2460722.269988766
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~2 min read
Article
40 Harmonia is a large main-belt asteroid. It was discovered by German-French astronomer Hermann Goldschmidt on March 31, 1856, and named after Harmonia, the Greek goddess of harmony. The name was chosen to mark the end of the Crimean War.
The asteroid is orbiting the Sun with a period of 3.42 years and a relatively low eccentricity of 0.046. It has a cross-sectional size of 107.6 km. The spectrum of 40 Harmonia matches an S-type (silicate) in the Tholen classification system, and is similar to primitive achondrite meteorites. Photometric observations at the Organ Mesa Observatory in Las Cruces, New Mexico during 2008–09 were used to generate a light curve that showed four unequal minima and maxima per cycle. The curve shows a period of 8.909 ± 0.001 hours with a brightness variation of 0.28 ± 0.02 in magnitude. This result is compatible with previous studies.