{"id":854207,"date":"2026-09-20T10:02:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T10:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/854207\/"},"modified":"2026-09-20T10:02:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T10:02:16","slug":"no-joke-u-of-a-grad-helped-name-asteroid-after-weird-al","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/854207\/","title":{"rendered":"No joke: U of A grad helped name asteroid after \u2018Weird Al\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lehrer\u2019s work includes \u201cThe Elements,\u201d<\/a> a 1959 song in which he recites the entire periodic table to the tune of Gilbert and Sullivan\u2019s \u201cMajor-General’s Song.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a mathematician and teacher and also wrote math- and science-themed songs,\u201d McGraw said. \u201cWe felt that someone who had that kind of science enthusiasm really deserved to have their name up in the sky.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Weird<\/p>\n

\u201cWeird Al\u201d Yankovic is famous for having his own asteroid obriting the sun between Mars and Jupiter. He also writes and performs parody songs and plays a mean accordion. He brings his show to the Tucson Arena Sunday night, Sept. 20.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Photo by Sam Jones<\/p>\n

Desch, McCoy and Brucker already have asteroids named after them, and now McGraw does, too.<\/p>\n

On July 9, (20092) Allisonmcgraw was added to the IAU WGSBN\u2019s official list<\/a> of minor planets, as was (20088) Adambattle, named for Adam Battle<\/a>, a planetary astronomer who studies near-Earth asteroids at the U of A\u2019s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory.<\/p>\n

McGraw is hoping that naming space rocks after stars like Lehrer and \u201cWeird Al\u201d will cast some reflected light on two things she\u2019s passionate about: asteroid research and science communication.<\/p>\n

\"Asteroid<\/p>\n

Planetary scientist Allison McGraw, a University of Arizona grad, gives a presentation at the Division of Planetary Science Conference in Helsinki, Finland, in 2025.<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Allison McGraw<\/p>\n

McGraw was born in Mesa and grew up in Texas. She returned to Arizona to study at the U of A, where she earned a bachelor\u2019s degree in geoscience and a master\u2019s and doctorate in planetary science. Along the way, she won a couple of NASA grants and awards, created digital models of Martian terrain and designed an educational program called \u201cMysterious Meteorites\u201d for Flandrau Science Center and Planetarium.<\/p>\n

She also put on educational presentations around Tucson, including something she called SMASHTROIDS!<\/a> that involved making data-based 3D models of real asteroids out of clay and metal and then letting audience members help her destroy them.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lehrer\u2019s work includes \u201cThe Elements,\u201d a 1959 song in which he recites the entire periodic table to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":854208,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[88,94089,79,3089,193],"class_list":["post-854207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-entertainment","tag-re-issue","tag-science","tag-science-technology","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=854207"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854207\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/854208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=854207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=854207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=854207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}