Beijing Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program

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Minor planets discovered: 1293 ^[1]

The Beijing Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program (SCAP) was an astronomical survey to search for near-Earth objects. It was conducted during the 1990s, at the Xinglong Station in Xinglong County, Chengde, Hebei province, China^[2] and resulted in the discovery of more than a thousand numbered minor planets.^[1]

Funded by the Chinese Academy of Science, the survey is sometimes also called BAO Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program and NAOC Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program, referring to the Beijing Astronomical Observatory (BAO) and National Astronomical Observatory of China (NAOC), respectively.^{[citation needed ]}

The instrument that SCAP used to detect near-Earth objects was a 60/90 cm Schmidt telescope. Equipped with a ×ばつ2048 CCD camera, this telescope was installed^{[when? ]} at the BAO Xinglong station in Hebei province, China.^{[citation needed ]}

In a conversation with Space.com contributor Michael Paine, SCAP head Jin Zhu said that the program's allotted time to use the Schmidt telescope was significantly reduced^{[when? ]} to make room for the observatory's other projects.^{[citation needed ]}

From 1995 to 1999, SCAP detected one new comet and 2460 new asteroids and observed 43860 other asteroids, making it the fifth largest asteroid observation project at that time. Five of the asteroids it discovered were NEAs, two of which were considered potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs). In 2002, an NEA was discovered near Earth's moon.^{[citation needed ]}

Name	Provisional designation	Discovery date	Remarks	Ref
7072 Beijingdaxue	1996 CB8	February 3, 1996	asteroid named after Peking University	MPC
7800 Zhongkeyuan	1996 EW2	March 11, 1996	asteroid named after the Chinese Academy of Sciences	MPC
13651	1997 BR	January 20, 1997	first potentially hazardous asteroid (PHA) discovered by SCAP	MPC
29552 Chern	1998 CS2	February 15, 1998	asteroid named after the Chinese mathematician Chern Shiing-shen	MPC
31065 Beishizhang	1996 TZ13	October 10, 1996	asteroid	MPC
136849	1998 CS1	February 9, 1998	potentially hazardous asteroid (PHA)	MPC
Zhu-Balam	C/1997 L1	June 3, 1997	comet named after SCAP head Jin Zhu and co-discoverer Dave Balam (Univ. of Victoria)	MPC

(503877) 2000 SR344	29 September 2000	list
(516041) 2015 TQ118	22 August 1998	list
(516297) 2016 WC53	14 October 1995	list
(537721) 2015 TO234	18 October 1996	list
Discoveries are credited with "Beijing Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program" by the Minor Planet Center

• List of minor planet discoverers § Discovering dedicated institutions

• WELCOME TO Xinglong Station of NAOC webpage for the station where SCAP was conducted. It also shows a picture of the Schmidt telescope that SCAP used in its research.
• BAO ASTEROID OBSERVATIONS: From Astrometry To Physical Researcj
• Bigger Telescopes Seek Killer Asteroids – a Space.com special report by Michael Paine on the search for near-Earth asteroids
• Asteroid Named to Mark CAS Anniversary ^{[permanent dead link ‍]} - a Beijing Review article by Li Rongxia on asteroid 7800
• China Builds New Observatory To Detect Near-Earth Asteroids – a Spacedaily.com article by Wei Long on the Purple Mountain Observatory. The SCAP is briefly mentioned here.
• § 1.8 New Asteroids – Discovering and Cataloging describes the groups involved with asteroid detection. SCAP is briefly mentioned here.