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:
“I got the sun in the morning and the moon at night.”
—Irving Berlin (1888–1989)
“I thought to hear him speak
the girl might rise
and make the garden silver,
as the white moon breaks,
“Nossis,” he cried, “a flame.””
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)
“And then we’ll sit
in the shadowy spruce and
pick the bones
of careless mice,
while the long moon drifts
toward Asia”
—John Haines (b. 1924)