![]() Names such as Achilles, Patroclus and Hektor were recommended from the Illiad, an ancient Greek poem.Īs more and more asteroids were discovered in Jupiter’s Lagrange points, astronomers also started naming them from the Trojan War and began referring to them as ‘Trojan asteroids’. Until Wolf’s discovery, most asteroids were given the names of women from Roman or Greek mythology. More such asteroids were discovered over subsequent months in Jupiter’s Lagrange point L5. It wasn’t until Wolf discovered the asteroid that Lagrange’s prediction acquired credibility. Lagrange had argued that if a small celestial body is placed at one of two stable points in a planet’s orbit around the Sun (the L4 and L5), the asteroid would remain stationary from the planet’s perspective due to the combined gravitational forces of the planet and the Sun. This specific position reminded Swedish astronomer Carl Charlier of a peculiar behaviour predicted by the Italian-French mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange over 100 years earlier. German astronomer Adolf Berberich observed that the asteroid was nearly 60 degrees in front of Jupiter. As Jupiter moved, this asteroid remained ahead of Jupiter. On February 22, 1906, German astrophotographer Max Wolf made an important discovery: An asteroid with a particularly unusual orbit. It took many a scientist to understand Trojans, and subsequently name them so. More than 7,000 Jupiter Trojan asteroids have been discovered as of 2020, two-thirds of which are located near L4 and the remaining near L5. It makes sense to call a Trojan a co-orbital object, which moves around one of the two stable Lagrangian points. Jupiter’s leading and trailing Lagrangian points (L4 and L5) have been stable over the age of the solar system. This means that that their orbits have accumulated many, many asteroids. ![]() ![]() This also means that asteroids are as far away from Jupiter as they are from the Sun. Lucy’s Trojan destinations are trapped near Jupiter’s Lagrange (L) points, which are gravitationally stable locations - it is where the gravity from the Sun and from Jupiter cancel each other out. This means their orbits are stable and the Trojans are trapped in the space between. It is the agency’s first single spacecraft mission in history to explore so many different asteroids. Lucy will fly by eight asteroids-seven Trojans and one main-belt asteroid - over the next 12 years. The swarms lead and follow the planet Jupiter along its orbit around the Sun. The United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched Lucy, the spacecraft, October 16, 2021, on a 12-year cruise to the swarms of these Trojans. Thousands of such asteroids exist in a gravitationally stable space. Simply known as Trojans, they are a large group of asteroids that share the Jupiter’s orbit around the Sun. Astronomers hope it will look back into the origins and evolution of the solar system formed over 4 billion years ago through these celestial bodies. Lucy is in the outer space and will go where no one else has before - to the Jupiter Trojan asteroids.
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