96 Aegle
96 Aegle is a carbonaceous asteroid and the namesake of the Aegle family located in the outer regions of the asteroid belt, approximately in diameter. It was discovered on 17 February 1868, by French astronomer Jérôme Coggia at the Marseille Observatory in southeastern France. The rare T-type asteroid has a rotation period of 13.8 hours and has been observed several times during occultation events. It was named after Aegle, one of the Hesperides from Greek mythology.
Orbit and classification
Aegle is the parent body of the Aegle family, a very small asteroid family of less than a hundred known members. It orbits the Sun in the outer asteroid belt at a distance of 2.6–3.5 AU once every 5 years and 4 months. Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.14 and an inclination of 16° with respect to the ecliptic. The body's observation arc begins at Litchfield Observatory in August 1870, two and a half years after its official discovery observation at Marseille.Physical characteristics
In both the Tholen and SMASS classification as well as in the Bus–DeMeo taxonomy, Aegle is a rare, anhydrous T-type asteroid, while the overall spectral type for the Aegle family is typically that of a C- and X-type.Rotation period
observations of the asteroid by American photometrist Frederick Pilcher from his Organ Mesa Observatory in New Mexico during 2016−17 showed an irregular lightcurve with a synodic rotation period of 13.868 hours and an amplitude of 0.11 in magnitude.This result is in good agreement with two previous observations by Robert Stephens, and by Cyril Cavadore and Pierre Antonini who measured a period of 13.82 hours and a brightness variation of 0.12 and 0.05, respectively. Other rotational lightcurves obtained by Alan Harris, by Italian, and Swiss/French astronomers, and at the Colgate University, are of poor quality.