It was discovered on 17 August 1933, by South African astronomer Cyril Jackson at the Union Observatory in Johannesburg, and given the provisional designation 1933 QM1.
[11][12][a] In September 2005, French amateur astronomers Laurent Bernasconi, Raymond Poncy and Pierre Antonini obtained a lightcurve with a concurring period of 13.623 hours and an amplitude of 0.36 magnitude (U=3).
[14] In 2011, a modeled lightcurve using data from the Uppsala Asteroid Photometric Catalogue (UAPC) and other sources gave a sidereal period 13.6228 hours, as well as a fragmentary spin axis of (n.a., -39.0°) in ecliptic coordinates (λ, β).
[5][6][7][8][9][10] The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link derives an albedo of 0.0479 and a diameter of 52.91 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 10.3.
[3] This minor planet was named after Utopia, the imaginary place that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its citizens, especially in laws, government, and social conditions.