Irina San Sebastián honored with asteroid naming

The International Astronomical Union (IAU) has officially named asteroid (20786) San Sebastián in honor of Argentine planetary scientist Irina San Sebastián. The celestial body, originally discovered on September 1, 2000, by the LINEAR program in New Mexico, United States, was identified for over two decades as 2000 RG62 before receiving its formal designation.

San Sebastián, a graduate of the National University of La Plata (UNLP), specializes in collisional evolution. Her research focuses on how impacts shape celestial bodies, ranging from the fragmentation of early planetary building blocks to the study of ‘rubble piles’—asteroid structures held together by gravity. She is currently conducting postdoctoral research at the Politecnico di Milano in Italy.