A catalog of near-IR absolute magnitudes of Solar System small bodies

¹ Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía, CSIC, Apt 3004, 18080 Granada, Spain
² Instituto de Física Aplicada a las Ciencias y las Tecnologías, Universidad de Alicante, San Vicent del Raspeig, 03080 Alicante, Spain
³ Astronomical Observatory Institute, Faculty of Physics and Astronomy, A. Mickiewicz University, Słoneczna 36, 60-286 Poznań, Poland
⁴ Centro de Estudios de Física del Cosmos de Aragón, Spain
⁵ UNESP, School of Engineering and Sciences, Department of Mathematics, Av. Dr. Ariberto Pereira da Cunha, 333 Guaratinguetá, 12516-410 São Paulo, Brazil
⁶ Laboratório Interinstitucional de e-Astronomia – LIneA, Av. Pastor Martin Luther King Jr 126, Del Castilho, Rio de Janeiro 20765-000, Brazil
⁷ Observatório Nacional, Rua Gal. José Cristino 77, Rio de Janeiro, RJ 20921-400, Brazil
⁸ Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería Informática (ETSINF), Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, Spain

^★ Corresponding author: alvaro@iaa.es

Received: 25 February 2025
Accepted: 29 July 2025

Abstract

Context. Phase curves of small bodies are useful tools for obtaining their absolute magnitudes and phase coefficients. The absolute magnitude relates to the object’s apparent brightness, while the phase coefficient relates to how the light interacts with the surface. Data from multiwavelength photometric surveys, which usually serendipitously observe small bodies, are becoming the cornerstone of large statistical studies of the Solar System. Nevertheless, to our knowledge, all studies have been carried out in visible wavelengths.

Aims. We aim to provide the first catalog of absolute magnitudes in near-infrared filters (Y, J, H, and K). We study the applicability of a nonlinear model to these data and compare it with a simple linear model.

Methods. We computed the absolute magnitudes using two photometric models: the HG₁₂^∗ and the linear model. We employed a combination of Bayesian inference and Monte Carlo sampling to calculate the probability distributions of the absolute magnitudes and their corresponding phase coefficients. We used the combination of four near-infrared photometric catalogs to create our input database.

Results. We produced the first catalog of near-infrared magnitudes. We obtained absolute magnitudes for over 10 000 objects (with at least one absolute magnitude measured), with about 180 objects having four absolute magnitudes. We confirm that a linear model that fits the phase curves produces accurate results. Since linear behavior describes the curves well, fitting to a restricted phase angle range (in particular, larger than 9.5 deg) does not substantially affect the results. Finally, we also detect a phase-coloring effect in the near-infrared, as has been observed in visible wavelengths for asteroids and trans-Neptunian objects.