Astronomers have discovered 128 new satellites that orbit Saturn.
This makes Saturn the absolute record holder among the other planets of the Solar System in terms of the number of celestial bodies orbiting it. Thus, the total known to scientists number of satellites of Saturn has reached 274. This figure is significantly higher than the number of satellites of its closest competitor, Jupiter, which has only 95.
The first hint that Saturn has still undiscovered satellites appeared between 2019 and 2021. At that time, 62 similar objects were detected. Smaller objects were also recorded, but could not be identified at the time.
«Knowing that these are likely satellites and that there are probably even more, we re-examined the same areas of the sky for three consecutive months in 2023 Of course, we have discovered 128 new satellites. Based on our forecasts, I don’t think Jupiter will ever overtake Saturn», — says the astronomer Edward Ashton from the Hsinsi Academy in Taiwan.
Saturn’s moons are not like our beautiful Moon. They are small space objects that resemble potatoes in shape, with a diameter of just a few kilometers. They are classified as irregular satellites.
In total, Saturn has 24 regular satellites and 122 — irregular satellites.
According to the researchers, first these satellites were a small group of objects caught in the gravitational pull of Saturn’s orbit. As a result of a subsequent series of collisions, these celestial bodies split into smaller objects that now orbit the planet in large numbers.
Astronomers believe that such collisions occurred only about 100 million years ago The Scandinavian Group — are satellites that orbit in a retrograde direction, at oblique angles and elliptical trajectories, outside Saturn’s rings. Like the recently discovered ones.
Scientists are inclined to believe that the clashes took place within the Scandinavian group of Saturn’s moons. This is a large group of retrograde irregular satellites The International Astronomical Union (IAU) reserves names for these months taken from Norse mythology.
The discovery of 17 new satellites in this group was announced in October 2019. A team led by Scott Z. Sheppard, using the Subaru Telescope on Mauna Kea, discovered 20 new satellites, each about 5 kilometers in diameter. It is believed that 17 of them are part of the Scandinavian group.
One of them is the farthest moon of Saturn. A public contest was announced to name these satellites, limited to names from Norse mythology. Ten of these satellites received their official names in August 2022.
Spelling error report
The following text will be sent to our editors: