IAU names asteroid on India's first professional meteorite scientist Ashwin Shekhar
The International Astronomical Union (IAU) has honored India's first professional meteorite scientist Ashwin Sekhar (Kerala) by naming a minor planet/asteroid after him. The honor was presented to him at the 2023 edition of the Asteroid Comet Meteorite Conference held in Arizona.
The minor planet named after Ashwin will now be known as (33928) Ashwinsekhar = 2000LJ27. Aswin is currently associated with the Paris Observatory which comes under the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Education of the French government.
The recipients of this honor before them are Nobel laureates CV Raman and Subramaniam
Chandrasekhar, the great mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan, eminent physicist, and astronomer Dr. Vikram Sarabhai, the great astronomer and former president of IAU Manali Kallat Venu Bappu and Wilson-Bappu.
Naming
The name of a person is verified and approved by the IAU SAML Body Nomenclature Committee. IAU was established in the year 1919. Its central secretariat is in Paris.
There are two nomenclature systems used for naming minor planets – formal and informal. Formal naming is akin to conferring honorary doctorates on celebrities.
Examples of formal naming systems are Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi, Pandit Jasraj, Viswanathan Anand, and Kailash Satyarthi. The purpose of the informal nomenclature system is to honor scientists for their outstanding work in their respective fields.
