2012 XE₁₃₃

2012 XE₁₃₃ was first observed on 12 December 2012 by J. A. Johnson working for the Catalina Sky Survey. As of March 2013, it has been observed 102 times with a data-arc span of 28 days. It is an Aten asteroid and its semi-major axis of 0.72 AU is very similar to that of Venus but its eccentricity is rather large (0.4332) and its inclination of 6.7° is also significant. With an absolute magnitude of 23.4, it has a diameter of approximately 62 to 138 meters. On 26 November 2020 it has been recovered and has now a well established orbit with an uncertainty parameter of 3.

2012 XE₁₃₃ has been identified as a Venus co-orbital following a transitional path between Venus's Lagrangian points L₅ point and L₃ point.[4] Besides being a Venus co-orbital, this asteroid is also a Mercury grazer and an Earth crosser. 2012 XE₁₃₃ exhibits resonant (or near-resonant) behavior with Mercury, Venus and the Earth.[4] Its short-term dynamical evolution is similar to that of two other Venus co-orbitals, 2001 CK32 and 2002 VE68.[4]

2012 XE₁₃₃ was included in the Minor Planet Center list of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) because it comes to within 0.05 AU of Earth periodically, but it has since been removed. It will approach Earth at 0.0055 AU (and the Moon at 0.0045 AU) on 30 December 2028.

• 2001 CK32
• 2002 VE68
• 2013 ND15

Further reading

• Understanding the Distribution of Near-Earth Asteroids Bottke, W. F., Jedicke, R., Morbidelli, A., Petit, J.-M., Gladman, B. 2000, Science, Vol. 288, Issue 5474, pp. 2190–2194.
• A Numerical Survey of Transient Co-orbitals of the Terrestrial Planets Christou, A. A. 2000, Icarus, Vol. 144, Issue 1, pp. 1–20.
• Debiased Orbital and Absolute Magnitude Distribution of the Near-Earth Objects Bottke, W. F., Morbidelli, A., Jedicke, R., Petit, J.-M., Levison, H. F., Michel, P., Metcalfe, T. S. 2002, Icarus, Vol. 156, Issue 2, pp. 399–433.
• Transient co-orbital asteroids Brasser, R., Innanen, K. A., Connors, M., Veillet, C., Wiegert, P., Mikkola, S., Chodas, P. W. 2004, Icarus, Vol. 171, Issue 1, pp. 102–109.
• The population of Near Earth Asteroids in coorbital motion with Venus Morais, M. H. M., Morbidelli, A. 2006, Icarus, Vol. 185, Issue 1, pp. 29–38.
• Asteroid 2012 XE133: a transient companion to Venus de la Fuente Marcos, C., de la Fuente Marcos, R. 2013, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol. 432, Issue 2, pp. 886–893.
• AstDys-2 on 2012 XE133 Retrieved 2013-02-20

• 2012 XE₁₃₃ data at MPC
• List of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs)
• 2012 XE133 at NeoDyS-2, Near Earth Objects—Dynamic Site
  • Ephemerides · Observation prediction · Orbital info · MOID · Proper elements · Observational info · Close approaches · Physical info · Orbit animation
• 2012 XE133 at ESA–space situational awareness
  • Ephemerides · Observations · Orbit · Physical properties · Summary
• 2012 XE133 at the JPL Small-Body Database