What are the 3 biggest moons on Neptune?
Neptune has a total of 14 known moons. The largest moon is Triton which was discovered by William Lassell just seventeen days after Neptune was found. One hundred years later the second moon, Nereid was found….List of moons.
Order | 1 |
---|---|
Label | Neptune III |
Name | Naiad |
Pronunciation (key) | ˈneɪ.əd |
Diameter (km) | 66 (96 × 60 × 52) |
How long does it take Galatea to orbit Neptune?
10 hours, 18 minutes
It has a diameter of 180 kilometers (110 miles) and completes an orbit in 10 hours, 18 minutes. It is irregularly shaped and shows no sign of any geological modification….
Galatea Statistics | |
---|---|
Equatorial radius (km) | 79 |
Equatorial radius (Earth = 1) | 1.2386e-02 |
Mean density (gm/cm^3) | ? |
Mean distance from Neptune (km) | 62,000 |
What is special about Neptune’s moon?
Triton is unique among moons of planetary mass in that its orbit is retrograde to Neptune’s rotation and inclined relative to Neptune’s equator, which suggests that it did not form in orbit around Neptune but was instead gravitationally captured by it.
What are Neptune’s 14 moons called?
Moving from closest to Neptune to furthest out, their names are Naiad, Thalassa, Despina, Galatea, Larissa, S/2004 N1 (which has yet to receive an official name), Proteus, Triton, Nereid, Halimede, Sao, Laomedeia, Psamathe, and Neso. The first moon to be discovered was Triton, which is also the largest one.
What planet has 4 rings 13 moons?
What planet has 4 rings 13 moons? The seventh planet from the Sun with the third largest diameter in our solar system, Uranus is very cold and windy. The ice giant is surrounded by 13 faint rings and 27 small moons as it rotates at a nearly 90-degree angle from the plane of its orbit.
What is Neptune’s second biggest moon?
Nereid
The first was Nereid, Neptune’s second largest and most massive moon, which was discovered on May 1st, 1949, by Gerard P. Kuiper (for whom the Kuiper Belt is named) using photographic plates from the McDonald Observatory in Fort Davis, Texas.
When was the moon Galatea discovered?
July 1989Galatea / Discovered
What is Neptune’s smallest moon called?
Hippocamp
Hippocamp is the smallest known moon of Neptune, with a diameter estimated at 34.8 km (21.6 mi). It is about 1,000 times less massive and 4,000 times less voluminous than its hypothesized progenitor, Proteus.
Is Pluto one of Neptune’s moons?
Before the discovery of Charon, it was popular to assume that Pluto was a former moon of Neptune that had somehow escaped its orbit. Because the revised mass of Pluto is only half that of Triton, Pluto clearly could not have caused the reversal of Triton’s orbit. …
Is Galatea a planet or a moon?
Galatea is a shepherd moon for the Adams ring of planet Neptune and is likely a rubble pile that has re-accreted from fragments of the original moons of Neptune that collided after the moon Triton was captured. Galatea is slowly spiraling down toward Neptune and will either smash into the planet or be pulled apart and form its own ring.
What is the history of Galatea?
Galatea was discovered in July 1989 by the Voyager 2 science team. Galatea is another of Neptune’s tiny moons. Small and irregularly-shaped like Despina, Galatea orbits in the same direction as Neptune and is relatively close to the gas giant’s equatorial plane. The small moon’s gravity is believed to cause disturbances in Neptune’s ring system.
What will happen to Galatea?
Galatea is slowly spiraling down toward Neptune and will either smash into the planet or be pulled apart and form its own ring. For a listing of all moons, see Moons of the Planets.
What is the name of the Moon on Neptune?
Galatea (moon) Galatea (/ˈɡæləˈtiːə/ GAL-ə-TEE-ə; Greek: Γαλάτεια), also known as Neptune VI, is the fourth-closest inner satellite of Neptune. It is named after Galatea, one of the fifty Nereids of Greek legend, with whom Cyclops Polyphemus was vainly in love. Galatea was discovered in late July 1989 from the images taken by the Voyager 2 probe.