61 Danaë

61 Danaë (pronounced /ˈdænəjiː/ DAN-ə-yee, sometimes /dəˈneɪə/ də-NAY-ə) is a quite large, rocky Main belt asteroid. It was discovered by H. Goldschmidt on September 9, 1860 and named after Danaë, the mother of Perseus in Greek mythology.

A satellite has been suggested in 1985 based on lightcurve data. [3] The primary's ellipsoid is then 85×80×75 km, and 101 km away would be the moon, measuring 55×30×30 km. The density of both would be 1.1 g/cm³.

Trivia

* It is the lowest-numbered asteroid with diacritical characters in its official name.

References

* A. Cellino, R. Pannunzio, V. Zappalà, P. Farinella, and P. Paolicchi, 1985, Do we observe light curves of binary asteroids?, Astronomy and Astrophysics, Vol. 144, No. 2, pp. 355–362.