A new moon for Neptune (original) (raw)

Hippocamp, a previously undetected moon of Neptune, has a peculiar location and a tiny size relative to the planet’s other inner moons, which suggests a violent history for the region within 100,000 kilometres of the planet.

By

  1. Anne J. Verbiscer
    1. Anne J. Verbiscer is in the Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22904, USA.

In 1989, the NASA spacecraft Voyager 2 detected six moons of Neptune that are interior to the orbit of the planet’s largest moon, Triton1. In a paper in Nature, Showalter et al.2 report the discovery of a seventh inner moon, Hippocamp. Originally designated as S/2004 N 1 and Neptune XIV, this moon was found in images taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 2004–05 and 2009, and then confirmed in further images captured in 2016. Hippocamp is only 34 kilometres wide, which makes it diminutive compared with its larger siblings, and it orbits Neptune just inside the orbit of Proteus — the planet’s second largest moon.

Access options

Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals

Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription

$32.99 / 30 days

cancel any time

Subscribe to this journal

Receive 51 print issues and online access

$199.00 per year

only $3.90 per issue

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Additional access options:

Nature 566, 328-329 (2019)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-00576-1

References

  1. Smith, B. A. et al. Science 246, 1422–1449 (1989).
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  2. Showalter, M. R., de Pater, I., Lissauer, J. J. & French, R. S. Nature 566, 350–353 (2019).
    Article Google Scholar
  3. Parker, A. H. et al. Astron. J. 145, 96 (2013).
    Article Google Scholar
  4. Brown, M. E. & Batygin, K. Astrophys. J. Lett. 824, L23 (2016).
    Article Google Scholar
  5. Showalter, M. R. Nature 351, 709–713 (1991).
    Article Google Scholar
  6. Showalter, M. R. & Lissauer, J. J. IAU Circ. 8209 (2003).
  7. Showalter, M. R. et al. IAU Circ. 9221 (2011).
  8. Showalter, M. R. et al. IAU Circ. 9253 (2012).
  9. Showalter, M. R. & Hamilton, D. P. Nature 522, 45–49 (2015).
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  10. Spencer, J. R. et al. EPSC Abstr. 10, EPSC2015-417 (2015).
    Article Google Scholar
  11. Burns, J. A. et al. Science 284, 1146–1150 (1999).
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  12. Verbiscer, A. J., Skrutskie, M. F. & Hamilton, D. P. Nature 461, 1098–1100 (2009).
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  13. Giese, B., Neukum, G., Roatsch, T., Denk, T. & Porco, C. C. Planet. Space Sci. 54, 1156–1166 (2006).
    Article Google Scholar

Download references

Subjects

Latest on: