Pallas

Pallas is a minor planet orbiting the Sun in the asteroid belt, located between Mars and Jupiter. It was discovered by Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers on March 28, 1802, and is named after Pallas Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom and war. Pallas is the third-largest asteroid in the Solar System, with a diameter of approximately 544 kilometers (338 miles). It has a nearly spherical shape and is composed primarily of rock and metal. Pallas is classified as a P-type asteroid, which means it has a primitive composition and is thought to be one of the oldest objects in the asteroid belt. The surface of Pallas is heavily cratered, with the largest crater, Pallas, being about 300 kilometers (186 miles) in diameter. Pallas has a relatively fast rotation period of about 7.8 hours. It is one of the few asteroids that can be seen with the naked eye under dark skies. Pallas is also notable for its high albedo, which means it reflects a significant amount of sunlight. This makes it one of the brightest asteroids in the Solar System. Despite its size and brightness, Pallas has not been visited by any spacecraft as of 2023.