Moon
In 2005, the adaptive optics team at the Keck telescopes in Hawaii carried out observations of the four brightest TNOs (Pluto, Makemake, Haumea, and Eris), using the newly commissioned laser guide star adaptive optics system. Images taken on September 10 revealed a moon in orbit around Eris. In keeping with the "Xena" nickname already in use for Eris, Brown's team nicknamed the moon "Gabrielle", after the television warrior princess's sidekick. When Eris received its official name from the IAU, the moon received the name Dysnomia, after the Greek goddess of lawlessness who was Eris's daughter. Brown says he picked it for similarity to his wife's name, Diane. The name also retains an oblique reference to Eris's old informal name Xena, portrayed on TV by Lucy Lawless.
Read more about this topic: Eris (dwarf Planet)
Famous quotes containing the word moon:
“The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits;—”
—Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)
“The moon will run all consciences to cover....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“No, they are dark and wrinkled and hairy,
caves of the Moon . . .——— And when a
dark humming fills us, a
coldness towards life,
we are too much women to
own such unwomanliness.”
—Denise Levertov (b. 1923)