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From asteroid to hero - the makings of a scientist

A South African scholar who sighted a new asteroid has become something of a hero for young science boffins in the country.

Ernie Halberg, a 12th grade student in South Africa, and member of The Astronomical Society of South Africa [ASSA] / Space School Africa, sighted a new asteroid known as 2010 DC2 for the first time earlier this year in February.

It is not the discovery of the asteroid itself which has garnered attention, it is that the discovery was made by a scholar in Africa.  Considering that finding an asteroid is a bit like looking for a needle in a haystack, and that it required many hours over several months of dedicated star-gazing, the feat becomes particularly meaningful.

So how did he do it?  Inspired by his science teacher Adrian Meyer to "find an asteroid", Ernie Halberg set off on a project on deep space observation.

Under the tutelage of veteran asteroid hunter and Canadian geophysicist Andrew Lowe, who confirmed the sighting of asteroid 2010 DC2,  Ernie rented time on a powerful telescope based remotely in New Mexico in the USA.  The telescopes and astronomical resources are managed by a company called  Global Rent a Scope (GRAS), a global network of professional grade remote access telescopes, based in the USA and Australia.

Via the internet and using a script, Ernie could direct one of the 10" (0.25m) G4 telescope at GRAS  (known as GRAS004) to point to a specific area and at a specific time. To search for asteroids, he downloaded the image files collected and searched for any unknown moving object against the fixed background of stars.

According to Lowe, Ernie noticed the reasonably bright unknown object while shooting a discovery field at a right ascension of 10h46m00s and declination of +02d50'30" and a second field at 10h46m00s +02d10'30". He measured the coordinates of the asteroid as it moved during 40 minutes. The find was also confirmed by the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, MA who designated the asteroid as 2010 DC2.

2010 DC2 is an asteroid of about 2 km in diameter, and at the time of sighting was in the finest view in the last 13 years. Before, the asteroid was fainter and in the far northern part of the sky or the far southern part of the sky, where professional surveys were not looking. 2010 DC2 takes about 4.23 years to go around the sun, and is in the middle part of the asteroid belt.

The orbit of 2010 DC2, showing the position of the asteroid and the earth and the other inner planets on February 18, the day that Ernie saw it for the first time. The sun and earth and asteroid are almost in a straight line, which is the ideal position to see the asteroid at its brightest. Since Ernie was using a 10" (0.25m) remote access telescope in New Mexico, which is quite small, this is an important consideration.

Accompanied by a flood of media attention, Ernie's discovery has been hailed by scientists from the Astronomical Society of Southern Africa ASSA as well as academics in universities.

With a future firmly in science, he has been selected as leader of the South African student delegation that will attend the Africa Astronomy Festival in 2011. During the program Ernie will give lectures on deep space observation and technical aspects of asteroid identification where remote access telescopes are used. And in the process, it is hoped, inspiring a generation of African astronomers and scientists.

More information:

National Youth Development Trust  www.nydt.org. Images courtesy NYDT

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