Kin Endate

Career in astronomy

Kin Endate was born in Iwaizumi in Iwate Prefecture and went to Hokkaido Designers School to study photography. He began taking astrophotos in high school, but did not begin serious asteroid observations until 1986.

His notable discoveries include the minor planets 5648 Axius and 6500 Kodaira, a Jupiter trojan and a Mars-crosser asteroid, respectively. He also recorded the first known precovery images of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 with his private 10-inch (25 cm) diameter telescope on March 15, 1993, ten days before the official discovery of the comet. Kin, who was looking specifically for asteroids, did not know of the comet in his images until after the official discovery.