CHAMPAIGN — After developing an algorithm to help protect Earth from asteroid impacts, University of Illinois Assistant Professor Siegfried Eggl was surprised to have an asteroid named after him.
Don’t worry — the 2.2-kilometer wide “28751 Eggl” won’t be crossing the Earth’s orbit any time soon.
That’s one of the few things scientists know about this particular asteroid.
“I am super excited to learn more about this object, as you can imagine,” Eggl said.
He hopes to learn more when the Vera C. Rubin observatory in Chile comes online.
Eggl’s algorithm, HelioLinc3D, will enable the observatory to cluster observations together in order to more accurately identify potentially dangerous asteroids.
The algorithm is in use at the University of Washington and has already led to the discovery of a near-Earth asteroid.
Eggl hasn’t just helped to detect asteroids, though — he also contributed to the NASA Double Asteroid Redirection Test that used a spacecraft to change the orbit of the asteroid Didymus last year.
He and student Rahil Makadia ran risk assessment for the mission.
“We knew right from the start that the mission would also deflect the entire system around the sun, if only a little bit,” Eggl said.
Eggl and Makadia made sure that the mission would not cause Didymus to crash into Earth later.
Scientific contributions to the field of planetary science like these were what made Eggl a candidate to have an asteroid named after him at the Asteroids, Comets, Meteors Conference this summer in Flagstaff, Ariz.
“What makes this award so special is its transcendence,” Eggl said. “This asteroid will be orbiting the sun long after I am gone and it will be called ‘Eggl’ for as long as humanity decides to remember.”
Eggl said that he has been fascinated by space since he was young, growing up in Spital am Pyhm in the Austrian Alps.
“Watching the night sky was and still is a profound experience,” Eggl said.
That’s why he pursued physics and astronomy degrees, plus a Ph.D. in astrophysics from the University of Vienna.
Eggl worked for the European Commission and later the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in planetary defense, which brought him more into the field of aerospace engineering.
These days, alongside being an assistant professor at UI, Eggl is continuing work with the Rubin Observatory as well as the International Astronomical Union Centre for the Protection of the Dark and Quiet Sky from Satellite Constellation Interference.
That’s a long name for a group with a fairly straightforward goal: to make man-made satellites in Earth’s orbit less intrusive.
They work with aerospace companies like SpaceX to find solutions to reduce the amount of light from the sun reflected by these satellites.
That light can interfere with data collection in fields like planetary defense.
Most of the satellites become brightest during twilight.
“That area covers orbits close to the one of the Earth around the sun, exactly where we suspect most of the potentially hazardous asteroids are still hiding,” Eggl said.