3703 Volkonskaya
3703 Volkonskaya, provisional designation, is a Vestian asteroid and asynchronous binary system from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately in diameter. It was discovered on 9 August 1978, by Soviet astronomers Lyudmila Chernykh and Nikolai Chernykh at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Nauchnij, on the Crimean peninsula. It was named by the discoverers after the Russian princess Mariya Volkonskaya. The V-type asteroid has a rotation period of 3.2 hours. The discovery of its 1.4-kilometer minor-planet moon was announced in December 2005.
Orbit and classification
Volkonskaya is a member of the Vesta family, when applying the hierarchical clustering method to its proper orbital elements. Vestian asteroids have a composition akin to cumulate eucrites and are thought to have originated deep within 4 Vesta's crust, possibly from the Rheasilvia crater, a large impact crater on its southern hemisphere near the South pole, formed as a result of a subcatastrophic collision. Vesta is the main belt's second-largest and second-most-massive body after. Based on osculating Keplerian orbital elements, the asteroid has also been classified as a member of the Flora family, a giant asteroid family and the largest family of stony asteroids in the main-belt.Volkonskaya orbits the Sun in the inner asteroid belt at a distance of 2.0–2.6 AU once every 3 years and 7 months. Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.13 and an inclination of 7° with respect to the ecliptic. The body's observation arc begins with a precovery taken at the Palomar Observatory in August 1953, or 25 years prior to its official discovery observation at Nauchnij.