Talk:Quasi-satellite

picture

Sorry about the picture quality...if someone can find a better one please replace it.

Well, I don't think that it has a poor quality (it looks smooth and has nice colors) but it lacks a feature. The unique feature that quasi-satellites seem to orbit the earth isn't visible in it. I have taken a picture out of a Public Domain GIF-sequence from Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the german article de:Quasisatellit about the same topic and translated the labelling to german and changed the size of the bodies to make the clearly visible. This image also shows the quasi-satellite's orbit (of asteroid 2002 AA29 in the future) from earth's point of view in a very self explanatory manner, but of course the colors aren't looking that nice and is has only a poor resolution. Perhapes you want to adopt it (vectorizing it in Photoshop and changing the colors) and want to make a more fancy looking one? The image can be found directly at de:Bild:2002aa29-orbit-4.png and the original GIF-sequence on http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/2002aa29/2002aa29f.gif on a nice web page with more animations: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/2002aa29.html . Arnomane (in german Wikipedia)

definition

A quasi-satellite is an object similar to a planet or satellite, but its orbit encompasses both its planet and the planet's star.

This is still confusing, because the orbits of true moons orbiting a planet also encompass the star simply by following the planet. Also "is an object similar to a planet or satellite" is not informative, because the definition of a quasi-satellite is all about its orbits (so I have removed at least this). Does anyone know a rigorous definition that lets you determine whether an object is a true or quasi satellite? Deuar 12:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Difference between quasi-satellite, co-orbital moon, and object on horseshoe orbits

Could someone please explain what the difference is between quasi-satellite, co-orbital moon, and objects on horseshoe orbits? The text is not too clear. Aren't objects in horseshoe orbits about the Earth in a 1:1 mean motion resonanance, at least temporarily? I would like to categorize all these objects accordingly, but its not clear if the planetary community even has a clear definition of what these things are. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lunokhod (talk • contribs) 11:41, 24 January 2007 (UTC).

Pluto

Couldn't Pluto be a Quasi-satellite of Uranus? Their orbits do cross. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Greggydude (talk • contribs) 13:02, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

broken link

Footnote 4 appears to be dead. A Russian-speaker could confirm that and possibly get more information; the link goes to what looks like a short error message in Russian. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.182.240.194 (talk) 14:26, 31 March 2010 (UTC)