The first confirmation of V-type asteroids among the Mars crosser population

TL;DR

This study confirms the presence of V-type asteroids in the Mars crossing region, revealing potential pathways for these bodies to reach Earth, which was previously unconfirmed.

Contribution

First observational confirmation of V-type asteroids among Mars crossers, including orbital evolution analysis indicating possible Earth impact trajectories.

Findings

Confirmed 3 V-type asteroids in Mars crossing region

One asteroid may collide with Earth in tens of millions of years

Identified potential delivery pathways for V-type asteroids to Earth

Abstract

The Mars crossing region constitutes a path to deliver asteroids from the Inner Main Belt to the Earth crossing space. While both the Inner Main Belt and the population of Earth crossing asteroids contains a significant fraction of asteroids belonging to the V taxonomic class, only two of such V-type asteroids has been detected in the Mars crossing region up to now. In this work, we searched for asteroids belonging to the V class among the population of Mars crossing asteroids, in order to support alternative paths to the delivery of this bodies into the Earth crossing region. We selected 18 candidate V-type asteroids in the Mars crossing region using observations contained in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Moving Objects Catalog. Then, we observed 4 of these candidates to take their visible spectra using the Southern Astrophysical Research Telescope (SOAR). We also performed the numerical simulation of the orbital evolution of the observed asteroids. We confirmed that 3 of the observed asteroids belong to the V class, and one of these may follow a path that drives it to an Earth collision in some tens of million years.