Planets

[iainjclark]

New planet found in our solar system. Okay, new Pluto-esque large asteroid thing found. (And as for whether Pluto is a planet, your guess is as good as mine...) The new object is somewhere between 70% and 200% of Pluto's size, and is 51 AU from the Sun, compared to Pluto's 39 AU, and the Earth's 1 AU. That's a looong way. Let's just say it would take a very long time to get a sun tan out there. The new planet also apparently has a strange inclination, but we won't go into that.

In other astronomy news, a frozen water ice lake has been found on Mars. Nice. :-)

Comments

[ajp.livejournal.com]

Exciting times in the world of astronomy...

According to an interview I heard on PM this evening; they've already picked out a proper name for the tenth planet (rather than 2003 EL61) - but won't reveal their choice until it's been approved by the International Astronomical Union.

[williamjm.livejournal.com]

Are you talking about 2003 EL61? If so, that's old news - a few hours after they announed that someone announced the discovery of 2003 UB313 which looks to be significantly larger than Pluto and 97 AU away. I feel a bit sorry for the discoverers of the smaller planet, they've been overshadowed a bit.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4730061.stm