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Asteroid · evidence and sources

4 Vesta

Second-largest asteroid and second-most massive object in the asteroid belt. Visited by NASA's Dawn spacecraft.

Kepler elements Orbit basis, the same label the app shows on the selection card.

Open in Space Time

Every aspect, with its origin

One record per aspect. The origin says what kind of thing each value is; the source says where it came from; the limit says what it cannot tell you.

ObservedCatalogComputedReconstructedIllustrativeUndocumented
Orbit Computed

Orbit from osculating elements

4 Vesta is placed by solving a Keplerian orbit at the simulation time (a = 2.4 AU, e = 0.0887, i = 7.1°, period 1,325.8 d).

SourceBundled orbital elements
EpochJD 2451545
MethodTwo-body propagation of the stored elements by the shared orbit service; no perturbations.
LimitThese elements are bundled with the object record without a recorded retrieval; the dated JPL Small-Body Database snapshot in the app's live catalog is the documented source for the same body.
Physical data Undocumented

Bulk properties

4 Vesta: mean radius 262.7 km; mass 2.590 × 10^20 kg. These values are bundled with the object record and drive the rendered size.

SourceBundled object record
LimitThe object catalog does not record where these values came from; treat them as unverified until the record is completed.
Appearance Illustrative

Close-up appearance

The surface is a procedural shape unless a source record above says otherwise. It is not a measured shape model.

SourceSpace Time rendering contract
LimitNot a resolved observation.
Description Undocumented

Description and facts

The short description and the fact list are written by the Space Time authors for orientation. They are not quoted from a catalog field and carry no citation of their own.

SourceSpace Time editorial text
LimitBackground reading is linked under Further reading; it is not the source of the displayed numbers.

What is not measured

  • Appearance: a picture, not a measurement. Close-up appearance. Not a resolved observation.

Not yet documented

  • Physical data: The object catalog does not record where these values came from; treat them as unverified until the record is completed.
  • Description: Background reading is linked under Further reading; it is not the source of the displayed numbers.

Dataset freshness

Snapshots this page depends on, read from the generated manifests at request time.
DatasetLast refreshedHorizonAutomated
Current comets and near-Earth asteroids no snapshot date Osculating elements at the snapshot epoch; propagated as two-body conics Yes, weekly (Monday data job)
npm run fetch:data

Sources cited

  • Bundled orbital elements
  • Bundled object record
  • Space Time rendering contract
  • Space Time editorial text

Further reading

Wikipedia: 4 Vesta (background only; not the source of the displayed numbers)

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