SB2

Asteroid science in the GAIA era
Convener: Alberto Cellino  | Co-Conveners: Paolo Tanga , Karri Muinonen 
Oral Program
 / Fri, 12 Sep, 09:00–10:30  / Room Mars

After its successful launch on December 19, 2013, Gaia has reached its planned orbital deployment in L2, has started scientific operations and the first asteroid data are being collected. Among its many goals, Gaia is expected to produce a revolution in asteroid science, being able not only to greatly improve our knowledge of asteroid orbits, but to produce an unprecedented wealth of results concerning the physical characterization of these objects, including accurate mass and bulk density measurement for the 100 biggest asteroids, and size, spin, overall shapes, spectral reflectance and taxonomy for many tens of thousands
asteroids. This opens new perspectives in asteroid science, and constitutes a big achievement for the European space science teams. This session will be devoted to a thorough discussion of these topics. An update on the status of the mission and the expected outcomes for asteroids, will also be provided.