(18) Melpomene
Template: Infobox Asteroid / Maintenance / Error 1
(18 ) Melpomene is an asteroid of the main asteroid belt, which was discovered on 24 June 1852 as the eighteenth asteroid by John Russell Hind.
It was named after celestial bodies Melpomene, the muse of tragic poetry and song of mourning.
Melpomene moves in an elliptical orbit around the sun. Here, the asteroid at perihelion and aphelion 1.8 2.8 AE is from the Sun. The orbit is inclined 10.1 ° to the ecliptic, the orbital eccentricity is 0.22.
Melpomene has a diameter of about 140 km. It has a relatively bright silicate- rich surface with an albedo of 0.22. While the opposition Melpomene reaches a brightness of 10.6 mag.
Observations suggest that Melpomene is accompanied by a smaller asteroid.