Apparent Activity of Centaur 2024 XE22
ATel #17855; Quanzhi Ye, James M. Bauer, Tony Farnham (Univ. Maryland), Peter VanWylen (Memphis, TN)
on 25 Jun 2026; 18:33 UT
Credential Certification: Carrie Holt (cholt@lco.global)
Previous analyses suggested that Centaur object 2024 XE22 was likely active based on its orbit, brightness, and the lack of past sightings (P. VanWylen, 2025; https://groups.io/g/comets-ml/message/33729). Here we report on our observations of 2024 XE22 obtained with the 4.3-m Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) on 2025 November 27 around 09:35 UTC. In three 5-minute exposures obtained through the ultra-broadband VR filter, the object exhibited a broad tail measured 10 arcsec in length extending towards a position angle of 270 degrees (measured from north through east) under a seeing condition of 1.6 arcsec. The object had an apparent magnitude of 21.7 ± 0.1 mag using a 5 arcsec photometric aperture calibrated with the r-band ATLAS-RefCat2 catalog. This brightness is consistent with the prediction of a V-band magnitude of 21.3 taking an asteroid model with H=14.26 and G=0.15, as listed in JPL orbit solution #4.
These results made use of the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) at Lowell Observatory. Lowell is a private, non-profit institution dedicated to astrophysical research and public appreciation of astronomy and operates the LDT in partnership with Boston University, the University of Maryland, the University of Toledo, Northern Arizona University and Yale University. The Large Monolithic Imager was built by Lowell Observatory using funds provided by the National Science Foundation (AST-1005313). The University of Maryland observing team consisted of James Bauer, Adeline Gicquel-Brodtke, Tony Farnham, Lori Feaga, Michael S.P. Kelley, Yaeji Kim, Ben Sharkey, Jessica Sunshine, and Quanzhi Ye.
