Eleanor F. Helin

Eleanor was born an only child to Fred and Kay Francis. At the age of five, she became ill with polio, which caused her to be bed-ridden for several months. Eleanor studied geology at Occidental College, leaving just shy of her graduation in 1954. where she organized and coordinated the International Near-Earth Asteroid Survey (INAS) during the 1980s, encouraging and stimulating worldwide interest in asteroids. In recognition of her accomplishments, she received NASA's Exceptional Service Medal. After conducting the PCAS photographic search program from Palomar for nearly 25 years, Helin concentrated on the new, upgraded Near Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) search program using electronic sensors on a large aperture telescope. The operations were conducted in 1996 at Hakeakalā Observatory in Maui, Hawai'i, and at Palomar in 2001 with the Samuel Oschin Telescope. She was the principal investigator for this program operating from JPL, for which she received the 1997 JPL Award for Excellence. She also received NASA's Group Achievement Award for the NEAT Team. In operation from 1995 to 2007, NEAT was the first autonomous observing program; no JPL personnel were on-site, only the JPL Sunspark computer which ran the observing system through the night and transmitted the data back to JPL each morning for team member review and confirmation. NEAT detected over 26,000 objects, including 31 near-Earth asteroids, two long period comets and the unique object, 1996 PW, the most eccentric asteroid known (e = 0.99012940), which moves in a long-period (4110.50 a), comet-like orbit (semi-major axis 256.601 AU). Helin retired from NASA in 2002, and died in January 2009. Caltech Optical Observatories hosted a Helin Commemorative Workshop on 28 September 2010 to honour the contributions of Eleanor and Ronald Helin. Palomar Observatory opened an exhibit dedicated to her and her work with the 18-inch Schmidt telescope in September 2013. == Awards and honors ==

The Mars-crossing asteroid 3267 Glo, discovered by Edward Bowell in 1981, was named after her nickname. Helin was awarded the NASA Exceptional Service Medal. In 1998 she was inducted to the Women in Technology Hall of Fame. == Discoveries by Helin ==

Helin is credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery or co-discovered of more than 900 numbered minor planets, including the first two Aten asteroids: 2062 Aten and 2100 Ra-Shalom, which gave rise to this new orbital group of near-Earth objects. She also discovered: • Apollo asteroids such as 2135 Aristaeus, 3360 Syrinx, 4034 Vishnu, 4197 Morpheus, 4660 Nereus, 4769 Castalia and 6489 Golevka, among others, • Amor asteroids such as 3757 Anagolay, 3988 Huma, 4055 Magellan, 4957 Brucemurray, 5653 Camarillo, 7336 Saunders and 8013 Gordonmoore, • three Jupiter trojans including 3240 Laocoon, • Mars-crossers such as 9969 Braille, • hundreds of main-belt asteroids such as 4897 Tomhamilton, Comets Comets discovered by Eleanor F. Helin include: • 151P/Helin • C/1977 H1 (Helin) She also co-discovered the following comets with other astronomers: • Comet Helin–Alu • C/1991 L4 (Helin–Alu) • C/1992 A1 (Helin–Alu) • Comet Helin–Roman • C/1989 R1 (Helin–Roman) • Comet Helin–Roman–Alu • 117P/Helin–Roman–Alu • 132P/Helin–Roman–Alu • C/1989 T1 (Helin–Roman–Alu) • Comet Helin–Roman–Crockett • 111P/Helin–Roman–Crockett • Comet Helin–Lawrence • 152P/Helin–Lawrence • C/1991 F2 (Helin–Lawrence) • C/1992 Q2 (Helin–Lawrence) Additionally, she is also credited for rediscovering one previously lost comet / active asteroid: • 107P/Wilson–Harrington List of discovered minor planets } } == See also ==