About my discoveries of two asteroids which were named in honor of my great-grandfathers.

Currently, in astronomy many asteroids have already been discovered, for example, bright or close to Earth, but among minor planets fainter than 20th apparent magnitude, unknown ones can still be found, but for an amateur astronomer this is difficult to do due to the fact that large automatic sky surveys constantly monitor the sky and often find new objects.

In July 2020 I found asteroid 2020 OZ7 https://minorplanetcenter.net/db_search/show_object?utf8=✓&object_id=2020+OZ7 during the International Astronomical Search Campaign, but this cannot be called my discovery, because the observers were from the Pan-STARRS team, and I was only a measurer.

In 2022, I got a few hours of observing time (for my astrometric measurements of comets and asteroids) at a two-metre-aperture robotic Liverpool Telescope (LT) https://telescope.livjm.ac.uk/About/ located on the island of La Palma (Canary Islands).

At the end of October-beginning of November 2022, I tried to search for asteroids using the LT: I found two asteroids (in the resulting images) for which Minor Planet Checker (MPChecker) https://minorplanetcenter.net/cgi-bin/checkmp.cgi showed no matches with known asteroids. I observed them for a few days further, but then there was an updated information that they were already known. However, my astrometric data was useful in refining their orbits.

Before the November new moon of 2022, I continued to search for asteroids: I have chosen the areas of the sky near the ecliptic and in the opposition region that a few days before (at that time) were not covered by sky surveys (I found this information in the Sky Coverage Plots https://minorplanetcenter.net/iau/SkyCoverage.html ). On November 23, 2022, two fields of 10x10 arc minutes were photographed, and on one of them I found an unknown asteroid which I designated as RFD0004, on the second field I found an asteroid RFD0005. I made astrometric measurements and sent my data to the Minor Planet Center.

I calculated (using the New Object Ephemeris Generator https://minorplanetcenter.net/iau/MPEph/NewObjEphems.html ) where the asteroids will be in the sky in a day and on November 24, 2022, I received new photographs of the requested areas of the sky. I found RFD0004 again but I didn't find RFD0005 (maybe it was beyond the bounds of the images), but I found another asteroid RFD0006.

I continued to track these asteroids in the sky (to improve information about their orbits) using the LT for a month, and in December 2022 these asteroids received provisional designations in the Minor Planet Center database: RFD0006 was designated as 2022 WY16, RFD0004 was designated as 2022 WY17, my first observations were received the discovery asterisks. I will add that these asteroids had an apparent magnitude of about +21 at the time of their discovery.

Assigning permanent designations (numbers) to minor planets occurs when their orbits are well known (when they have been observed for several oppositions), and it usually takes many years after they are discovered, but in the case of these asteroids, they were found in archival images of sky surveys (for example, 2022 WY16 was found in images from 2002 of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey!), and this made it possible to increase their observation arcs, as a result of which in July 2023 these asteroids received numbers in the circular https://www.minorplanetcenter.net/iau/ECS/MPCArchive/2023/MPC_20230706.pdf of the Minor Planet Center: (623826) = 2022 WY16 and (623827) = 2022 WY17, and there it was confirmed that I am the discoverer of these asteroids!

The MPC defines discoverer when the object is numbered, and by now these are the first numbered asteroids discovered at the Liverpool Telescope, and also these are the first asteroids discovered by me; information about me appeared in the Minor Planet Discoverers list: https://www.minorplanetcenter.net/iau/lists/MPDiscsNum.html

Numbered asteroids can be named, and in July 2023 I proposed — to the Working Group Small Bodies Nomenclature (WGSBN) of the International Astronomical Union — naming these asteroids in honor of my great-grandfathers. As a result, on September 25, 2023, the WGSBN Bulletin Volume 3, #13, 19 https://www.wgsbn-iau.org/files/Bulletins/V003/WGSBNBull_V003_013.pdf was published in which these asteroids received names: (623826) Alekseyvarkin — in honor of Aleksey Makarovich Varkin (1923–1986), and (623827) Nikandrilyich — in honor of Nikandr Ilyich Romanov (1916–1999).

I note that there are currently only 24447 named minor planets, so this is a rare achievement for an amateur astronomer.

Information about these asteroids:

(623826) Alekseyvarkin = 2022 WY16
https://minorplanetcenter.net/db_search/show_object?object_id=623826
Discovered on 2022-11-24. It has an absolute magnitude https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/ast_size_est.html H = 18.37 and orbital https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/sbdb_lookup.html#/?sstr=623826&view=VOPDA  period of 4.4 years. This is the Main-belt asteroid, its orbital elements allow it to be classified as a member of the Eunomia family https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eunomia_family

(623827) Nikandrilyich = 2022 WY17
https://minorplanetcenter.net/db_search/show_object?object_id=623827
Discovered on 2022-11-23. It has an absolute magnitude H = 17.27 and orbital https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/sbdb_lookup.html#/?sstr=623827&view=VOPDCA period of 5.78 years. This is the Outer Main-belt asteroid.

Now I am the discoverer (by self-education) of 81 variable stars, 10 planetary nebula candidates, 3 novae in M31, 2 supernovae, 3 transients (possible supernovae), 4 pairs of binary stars and 2 asteroids; I love to study and popularize the science of astronomy to the public and I plan to study as an astronomer at university in the near future in order to make even greater contributions to the science of astronomy with my discoveries and research in it.

I am attaching the images (which I made from the discovery photos taken using the Liverpool Telescope — stacked 5x60 sec. with Sloan r’ filter): asteroids (623826) Alekseyvarkin = 2022 WY16 and (623827) Nikandrilyich = 2022 WY17.