Solar System

[fresa]

Recently, they have been found some more satellites of Jupiter. Could you please tell me exactly how many satellites ?

[Dan Luna]

61 I think. Type "Jupiter Satellites" into the Search box at the top right of the page.

[Tiny]

Maybe there is more than 61 moons...
hope this website help :
http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/~sheppard/satell...es/jup2003.html

[DippyHippy]

Going by the Nine Planets site, there are 38 named moons...

[antoniseb]

Yes, but if they count any piece of non-gasious material orbiting a planet a moon, they will eventually discover millions of little things only a few meters across. Maybe they're all moons, or maybe we need to create an implied minimum size in our terminology.

How many moons make up Saturn's rings?

[Tiny]

How many moons make up Saturn's rings?

The stars in the Milky Way x 10,000

[Planetwatcher]

Last I knew Jupiter stood at 61 known satelites. Of those 38 are named.

[Planetwatcher]

Saturn has 6 moons in its rings. They are called Shepherd moons.
Jupiter has 4 Shepherd moons.
Uranus has 2, and Neptune 3 I think.

[damienpaul]

I have come up with 61 known moon as well, however just a quick question, which as the more moons Jupiter or Saturn?

[galaxygirl]

I think that Jupiter has the most moons as far as I know of, but if you count every little dust particle of Saturn's rings as being a moon, then that would have more. I think... :huh: I'm really confused now.

[fresa]

I have tried some website about jupiter's satellite, but some write that there are 63 and some write that there are 40....wow, :huh:
But I couldn't see any news in nasa web telling about that or maybe, i don't access that site very often!

[Dan Luna]

I agree with antoniseb, there is no such thing as a moon in reality, only in our concepts.

[Planetwatcher]

Here is the latest I can find on Jupiter. Last known total was 61.
More moons for Jupiter

Saturn has 30, and Uranus has 24. Jupiter's count here was before we knew there were 61 around Jupiter.
new moons for Uranus


Neptune has 11 moons.
Neptunes new moons.

So Jupiter has the most, followed by Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

[damienpaul]

wow, so the further one goes out the less moons there are? interesting

[TheThorn]

Or more likely, the farther away the harder it is to discover small moons.

Or even more likely, the larger the planet the more moons.

Or most likely of all, a little from column A and a little from column B.

[damienpaul]

But isn't Neptune larger than Uranus?

I dod agree though with you Thorn, it is just really possibly from our perspective.

[Planetwatcher]

But isn't Neptune larger than Uranus?

No Uranus is slightly larger, but Neptune is a little heavier.

But another factor to consider is that Neptune is inside the Kupier belt, although not by much. But enough that some of it's moons could have been perturbed by other KBOs and became KBOs themselves. It's been a long propounded theory that Pluto is actually and escaped moon of Neptune.

[fresa]

Here is the latest I can find on Jupiter. Last known total was 61.
More moons for Jupiter

Saturn has 30, and Uranus has 24. Jupiter's count here was before we knew there were 61 around Jupiter.
new moons for Uranus


Neptune has 11 moons.
Neptunes new moons.

So Jupiter has the most, followed by Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

So I think those discoveries have just been showed in some websites, there haven't been any publication about that. Isn't it?....
Hmmm Is Sedna reconized a planet ? And do u think it has some moon? h34r:

[Planetwatcher]

So I think those discoveries have just been showed in some websites, there haven't been any publication about that. Isn't it?....

Those discoveries were published as much as a year ago. The links I provide are part of Universe Today news archives.

If other sites dealing with the Solar System don't have this info, it's simply because they haven't updated. With these discoveries coming in so fast and so often, it is very difficult to keep up.

Hmmm Is Sedna reconized a planet ? And do u think it has some moon?

Officially Sedna is being called a planetoid, which basicly means it is recongized as only a large asteroid in the Kupier Belt. It may have a moon/moons, but they would be very difficult to detect given the great distance.

[TheThorn]

The discoverers of Sedna speculate that it has a satellite. It's light curve suggests that it rotates with a period of 40 days - very slowly for an object that size, which probably means it is tidally locked with a satellite. It would probably be very hard to see the satellite at this distance.

I think eventually they will decide that Sedna and Pluto are not planets, if they ever get around to properly defining the term. The problem is that there was a major emotional reaction the last time it was officially suggested that maybe Pluto should be considered to be a large KBO rather than a planet, so the IAU backed off and is just ignoring the issue.

There is no official definition of what a planet is. We all thought that we knew the difference between a planet, an asteroid, and a moon, but the lines are getting blurred. Sedna is almost as big as Pluto, and both are significantly smaller than our moon. And the IAU doesn't appear interested in clearing things up.

Which leaves the current de-facto definition of the word planet as: "One of the following objects - Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, or Pluto."

Sedna's not in there, so it isn't a planet. Pluto is in there, so it is. No other justification required.