New Constraints on the Asteroid 298 Baptistina, the Alleged Family Member of the K/T Impactor

TL;DR

This paper refines the physical properties of asteroid 298 Baptistina to better understand its potential link to the K/T impactor, providing new observational data and discussing implications for impact risk assessment.

Contribution

It presents new observational constraints on asteroid 298 Baptistina's physical properties, especially its rotational period, to evaluate its role as the K/T impactor source.

Findings

Rotational period of 298 Baptistina determined as 16.23 hours.

New constraints on physical properties of Baptistina asteroid family.

Implications for the asteroid's impact delivery potential.

Abstract

In their study Bottke et al. (2007) suggest that a member of the Baptistina asteroid family was the probable source of the K/T impactor which ended the reign of the Dinosaurs 65 Myr ago. Knowledge of the physical and material properties pertaining to the Baptistina asteroid family are, however, not well constrained. In an effort to begin addressing the situation, data from an international collaboration of observatories were synthesized to determine the rotational period of the family's largest member, asteroid 298 Baptistina (P_r = 16.23+-0.02 hrs). Discussed here are aspects of the terrestrial impact delivery system, implications arising from the new constraints, and prospects for future work.