{"id":17921,"date":"2019-10-07T19:05:21","date_gmt":"2019-10-07T11:05:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/astronomers-spot-20-more-moons-of-saturn-and-want-you-to-help-name-them\/"},"modified":"2019-10-07T19:05:21","modified_gmt":"2019-10-07T11:05:21","slug":"astronomers-spot-20-more-moons-of-saturn-and-want-you-to-help-name-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/astronomers-spot-20-more-moons-of-saturn-and-want-you-to-help-name-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Astronomers spot 20 more moons of Saturn \u2014 and want you to help name them"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Newfound
This artist\u2019s conception shows the 20 newly discovered moons orbiting Saturn. (Illustration courtesy of Carnegie Institute for Science. Saturn image courtesy of NASA \/ JPL-Caltech \/ Space Science Institute. Starry background courtesy of Paolo Sartorio \/ Shutterstock.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Saturn has pulled ahead of Jupiter again in the moon discovery race, thanks to a batch of 20 outer moons that bring the ringed planet\u2019s total tally to 82.<\/p>\n

The newly reported satellites, confirmed by the International Astronomical Union\u2019s Minor Planet Center, were found by the same team that reported spotting 12 new moons of Jupiter last year.<\/p>\n

As was the case with those moons of Jupiter, the discovery team at the Carnegie Institution for Science is soliciting suggestions for naming the newly reported moons of Jupiter. Right now, they\u2019re known only by their numerical designations, such as S\/2004 S29 or S5593a2.<\/p>\n

It took more than a decade to nail down the discovery: Starting in 2004, Carnegie\u2019s Scott Sheppard and his teammates captured imagery of Saturn and its surroundings using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii. Recently, the imagery was run through a computer analysis that tracked the newfound moon\u2019s motion.<\/p>\n

All of the moons are thought to be in the range of 3 miles across. Three of them orbit Saturn in the same direction as the planet\u2019s rotation, while the other 17 go in the opposite direction. Their orbital periods range from about two years to more than three years.<\/p>\n

\u201cStudying the orbits of these moons can reveal their origins, as well as information about the conditions surrounding Saturn at the time of its formation,\u201d Sheppard said in a news release.<\/p>\n

Two of the moons appear to be part of a known collection of Saturnian moons called the Inuit group. They all may have been part of a larger moon that was broken apart in the distant past. The same goes for the 17 retrograde moons, which are in the Norse group.<\/p>\n

The other newfound moon traces an inclination that\u2019s similar to Saturn\u2019s Gallic-group moons, but it\u2019s much farther out. That suggests that it might have been pulled outward over time due to gravitational influences, or that it\u2019s just an odd duck.<\/p>\n