Asteroid
A metal-rich asteroid thought to be the exposed core of an early planetary building block.
| Type | Asteroid |
|---|---|
| Distance from the Sun | 2.92 AU |
| Diameter | 220 km |
| Mass | 2.29 × 10¹⁹ kg |
| Temperature | -123°C |
| Orbital period | 1,834 days |
| Rotation period | 4.196 hours |
| Apparent magnitude | 9.2 |
| Redshift | 0 |
| Discovered | 1852 |
Asteroids are rocky leftovers from the solar system's formation, most of them confined to the belt between Mars and Jupiter where Jupiter's gravity kept them from ever assembling into a planet.
At 220 km across, Psyche is 1.7 percent of the diameter of Earth.
Its mass is less than a thousandth of the mass of Earth.
It keeps an average distance of 2.92 AU from the Sun, so sunlight takes 24 minutes to reach it.
A single orbit takes 5.0 years.
An average temperature of 150 K works out at -123 degrees Celsius, colder than the 15 degrees Earth averages.
It has been on record since 1852.
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