Damocloid in the context of List of Saturn-crossing minor planets

⭐ Core Definition: Damocloid

Damocloids are a class of minor planets such as 5335 Damocles and 1996 PW that have Halley-type or long-period highly eccentric orbits typical of periodic comets such as Halley's Comet, but without showing a cometary coma or tail. David C. Jewitt defines a damocloid as an object with a Jupiter Tisserand invariant (T_J) of 2 or less, while Akimasa Nakamura defines this group with the following orbital elements:

q < 5.2 AU, a > 8.0 AU, and e > 0.75,
or alternatively, i > 90°

However, this definition that does not focus on Jupiter excludes objects such as (127546) 2002 XU93, 2003 WG₁₆₆, and (661238) 2004 DA₆₂.

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👉 Damocloid in the context of List of Saturn-crossing minor planets

A Saturn-crosser is a minor planet whose orbit crosses that of Saturn. The known numbered Saturn-crossers (as of 2005) are listed below. There is only one inner-grazer (944 Hidalgo) and no outer-grazers or co-orbitals known; most if not all of the crossers are centaurs. (15504) 1999 RG33 is a damocloid.

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⭐ Core Definition: Damocloid
👉 Damocloid in the context of List of Saturn-crossing minor planets
Damocloid in the context of Distant minor planet

Damocloid in the context of Distant minor planet

A distant minor planet, or distant object, is any minor planet found beyond Jupiter in the outer Solar System that is not commonly thought of as an "asteroid". The umbrella term is used by IAU's Minor Planet Center (MPC), which is responsible for the identification, designation and orbit computation of these objects. As of January 2025, the MPC maintains 6101 distant objects in its data base.

Most distant minor planets are trans-Neptunian objects and centaurs, while relatively few are damocloids, Neptune trojans or Uranus trojans. All distant objects have a semi-major axis (average distance from the Sun) greater than 6 AU. This threshold, which is just beyond the orbit of Jupiter (5.2 AU), ensures that the vast majority of "true asteroids" – such as the near-Earth, Mars-crosser, main-belt and Jupiter trojan populations – are excluded from the distant minor planets.

View the full Wikipedia page for Distant minor planet

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Damocloid in the context of List of Saturn-crossing minor planets

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⭐ Core Definition: Damocloid

👉 Damocloid in the context of List of Saturn-crossing minor planets

Damocloid in the context of Distant minor planet