Asteroid found that orbits the sun closer than Venus

There are only 21 confirmed asteroids that are orbit within Earth's orbit. And this one is even closer to the sun- inside Venus's orbit.

Astronomers at Caltech’s Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) have discovered an asteroid that orbits inside Venus. Though other asteroids have a portion of their orbit inside Venus’, this is the first one with an orbit that is completely inside Venus’ orbit. The new object is named 2020 AV2.

2020 AV2 is a member of a small class of asteroids called Atiras, objects with orbits inside Earth’s. There are only 21 of them confirmed as of now. They’re also called Interior-Earth Objects (IEOs) because they orbit inside Earth. 2020 AV2 is the first “Vatira” asteroid, where the V stands for Venus.


The asteroid was discovered as part of the ZTF’s Twilight Program. It was first flagged as a candidate on January 4th, 2020, and designated ZTF09k5. After that, an alert was sent out by the Minor Planet Center. After that, other telescopes around the world followed up on the asteroid. That helped confirm the asteroid ‘s orbit and its size.