How a New Methodology Rewrites the Age Book for Asteroids

Researchers at Cornell University have developed a new method for estimating the age of asteroids using dynamics, demonstrating this approach on the asteroid Selam, found to be around 2-3 million years old.

An asteroid discovered last November is in fact a solar system toddler – just 2-3 million years old, a Cornell University-led research team estimates using novel statistical calculations.

The team derived the age of Selam, a “moonlet” circling the small asteroid Dinkinesh in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, based only on dynamics, or how the pair moves in space. Their calculation agrees with one by NASA’s Lucy mission based on an analysis of surface craters, the more traditional method for dating asteroids.