Carl Gustav Witt
Encyclopedia
| 422 Berolina 422 Berolina 422 Berolina is a typical Main belt asteroid.It was discovered by G. Witt on October 8, 1896 in Berlin. It was first of his two asteroid discoveries. The other was the famous asteroid 433 Eros.... |
October 8, 1896 |
| 433 Eros 433 Eros 433 Eros is a near-Earth asteroid discovered in 1898, and the first asteroid to be orbited by a probe . It is an S-type asteroid approximately 34.4×11.2×11.2 km in size, the second-largest NEA after 1036 Ganymed, and belongs to the Amor group.Eros is a Mars-crosser asteroid, the first known... |
August 13, 1898 |
Carl Gustav Witt (October 29, 1866 – January 3, 1946) was a German astronomer
Astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
who used to work at the popular observatory of the Urania astronomical association of Berlin (Urania Sternwarte Berlin).
He wrote a doctoral thesis under the direction of Julius Bauschinger
Julius Bauschinger
-Biography:Julius Bauschinger was born in Fürth, the son of the physicist Johann Bauschinger. He studied at the Universities of Munich and Berlin, graduating under the direction of Hugo Hans von Seeliger with a thesis titled "Studies on the motion of the planet Mercury"...
.
He discovered two asteroid
Asteroid
Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...
s, most notably 433 Eros
433 Eros
433 Eros is a near-Earth asteroid discovered in 1898, and the first asteroid to be orbited by a probe . It is an S-type asteroid approximately 34.4×11.2×11.2 km in size, the second-largest NEA after 1036 Ganymed, and belongs to the Amor group.Eros is a Mars-crosser asteroid, the first known...
, the first known asteroid with an unusual orbit occasionally approaching the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
's (today it is classified as an Amor asteroid
Amor asteroid
The Amor asteroids are a group of near-Earth asteroids named after the asteroid 1221 Amor. They approach the orbit of the Earth from beyond, but do not cross it. Most Amors do cross the orbit of Mars...
). The other one, Berolina, bears the Latin name of his adoptive city.
Several decades after his death, minor planet (2732) Witt was named in his honor.