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UB313
Distant world tops Pluto for size
By Jonathan Amos
BBC News science reporter
An icy, rocky world reported last year to be orbiting the Sun in the distant
reaches of the Solar System really is bigger than Pluto, scientists say.
New observations of the object, which goes by the designation 2003 UB313, show
it to have a diameter of some 3,000km - about 700km more than Pluto.
The measurement was undertaken by a German team using a telescope in Spain, and
is published in the journal Nature.
It is likely to bolster claims for the body to be given planet status.
On the other hand, it will also give support to those who believe Pluto has an
inflated position and should be downgraded to a more minor classification.
Perhaps we should just sit back and relax and see what else is discovered out
there in the near future
Prof Iwan Williams, Queen Mary University of London
"I'm easy on this," said the Nature paper's lead author, Professor Frank
Bertoldi, from the University of Bonn and the Max-Planck-Institute for
Radioastronomy.
"I would not want to demote Pluto for historical and cultural reasons - you'd
upset the schoolchildren. So, it seems only fair to call objects larger than
Pluto planets as well. I think we could cope," he told the BBC News website.
Icy belt
Like Pluto, 2003 UB313 orbits beyond Neptune in a region known as the Kuiper Belt.
Scientists think there are probably many tens of thousands of freezing bodies in
this ring of debris left over from the formation of the Solar System.
But 2003 UB313 is the first to be identified with a girth that exceeds Pluto's.
The German team looked at the far-off world using the 30m Iram (Institut de
RadioAstronomie Millimetrique) telescope at Pico Veleta in the Sierra Nevada
mountains.
Using a standard astronomical approach, the group was able to arrive at a figure
for the diameter by measuring the heat radiated by the object and combining this
with information about the amount of sunlight reflected off its surface.
The calculation of 3,000km has some uncertainty attached to it - which means the
world could be up to 300km smaller or bigger - but either way, it still
represents the largest object found in the Solar System since Neptune in 1846.
August meeting
Michael Brown, the California Institute of Technology astronomer who announced
2003 UB313's discovery with colleagues last July, has nicknamed the object Xena
and is pressing for it to be given full planet status.
If granted such a classification, the object would assume a name from Greek or
Roman mythology.
2003 UB313 (XENA)
First seen in 2003 but finally recognised in 2005
Highly elongated orbit around Sun lasting 558 years
Currently positioned some 14.5 billion km from Earth
Has extremely frigid surface temperature of -250C
May have thin atmosphere when closest to Sun
Has moon with unofficial 'codename' of Gabrielle
Names come from US TV series, Xena: Warrior Princess
But the request has led to heated discussions within the science of astronomy
which is now facing up to the prospect of even more objects of similar size
being discovered in the Kuiper Belt in the next few years. Can they all be
classed as planets?
"Theories for the formation of our Solar System imply there could be objects as
big as Mars out there," commented Professor Alan Fitzsimmons, from Queen's
University Belfast.
"We knew the day would come when something at least as large as Pluto, if not
bigger, would be discovered."
And on the matter of whether it should be called a planet: "It's very difficult;
my head scientifically pulls one way and my heart another. I just don't know."
The discipline's official nomenclature duties rest with the International
Astronomical Union (IAU), which will discuss the classification of planets at
its General Assembly in August.
'Relax' option
It will consider an options report drawn up by a working group chaired by
Professor Iwan Williams, from Queen Mary University of London.
"You could have a distinction which says, 'everything bigger than Pluto is a
planet', but then you are in danger of finding four or five of these objects in
the next few years and you end up asking yourself, 'did we really mean to create
15 planets?'"
Professor Williams conceded it would be extremely hard to arrive at a definition
for a planet that satisfied everyone.
It was possible, he added, that the IAU could simply defer any decisions until
it became clearer just how many objects might be candidates for planet
classification.
"Perhaps we should just sit back and relax and see what else is discovered out
there in the near future."
Mike
Brown's team is expected to come forward soon with its own measurement of
the diameter of 2003 UB313 using data from the Hubble Space Telescope.
Story from BBC NEWS:
news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/4667100.stm
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Sedna is the Inuit Goddess of the Sea
www.hvgb.net/~sedna/story.html
Nowootkryta planeta Sedna ...zwiazana jest z mitologia Inuicka ...
As the legend goes, Sedna was a beautiful Inuit girl who lived with her father.
She was very vain and thought she was too beautiful to marry just anyone. Time
and time again she turned down hunters who came to her camp wishing to marry
her. Finally one day her father said to her "Sedna, we have no food and we will
go hungry soon. You need a husband to take care of you, so the next hunter who
comes to ask your hand in marriage, you must marry him." Sedna ignored her
father and kept brushing her hair as she looked at her reflection in the water.
Soon her father saw another hunter approaching their camp. The man was dressed
elegantly in furs and appeared to be well-to-do even though his face was
hidden. Sedna's father spoke to the man. "If you wish to seek a wife I have a
beautiful daughter . She can cook and sew and I know she will make a good
wife." Under great protest, Sedna was placed aboard of the hunters kayak and
journeyed to her new home. Soon they arrived at an island. Sedna looked around.
She could see nothing. No sod hut, no tent, just bare rocks and a cliff. The
hunter stood before Sedna and as he pulled down his hood, he let out and evil
laugh. Sedna's husband was not a man as she had thought but a raven in
disguise. She screamed and tried to run, but the bird dragged her to a clearing
on the cliff. Sedna's new home was a few tufts of animal hair and feathers
strewn about on the hard, cold rock. The only food she had to eat was fish. Her
husband, the raven, brought raw fish to her after a day of flying off in search
of food.
Sedna was very unhappy and miserable. She cried and cried and called her
father's name. Through the howling arctic winds Sedna's father could hear his
daughter's cries. He felt guilty for what he had done as he knew she was sad.
Sedna's father decided it was time to rescue his daughter. He loaded up his
kayak and paddled for days through the frigid arctic waters to his Sedna's
home. When he arrived Sedna was standing on the shore. Sedna hugged her father
then quickly climbed into his kayak and paddled away. After many hours of
travel Sedna turned and saw a black speck far off into the distance. She felt
the fear well up inside of her for she knew the speck was her angry husband
flying in search of her.
The big black raven swooped down upon the kayak bobbing on the ocean. Sedna's
father took his paddle and struck at the raven but missed as the bird continued
to harass them. Finally the raven swooped down near the kayak and flapped his
wing upon the ocean. A vicious storm began to brew. The calm arctic ocean soon
became a raging torrent tossing the tiny kayak to and fro. Sedna's father
became very frightened. He grabbed Sedna and threw her over the side of the
kayak into the ocean. "Here, he screamed, here is your precious wife, please do
not hurt me, take her."
Sedna screamed and struggled as her body began go numb in the icy arctic
waters. She swam to the kayak and reached up, her fingers grasping the side of
the boat. Her father, terrified by the raging storm, thought only of himself as
he grabbed the paddle and began to pound against Sedna's fingers. Sedna
screamed for her father to stop but to no avail. Her frozen fingers cracked and
fell into the ocean. Affected by her ghastly husbands powers, Sedna's fingers
while sinking to the bottom, turned into seals. Sedna attempted again to swim
and cling to her father's kayak. Again he grabbed the paddle and began beating
at her hands. Again Sedna's hands, frozen by the arctic sea again cracked off.
The stumps began to drift to the bottom of the sea, this time turned into the
whales and other large mammals. Sedna could fight no more and began to sink
herself.
Sedna, tourmented and raging with anger for what had happened to her, did not
perish. She became, and still is today, the goddess of the sea. Sedna's
companions are the seals, and the whales that sit with her at the bottom on the
ocean. Her anger and fury against man is what drums up the violent seas and
storms . Hunters have a great respect for her. Legend has it that they must
treat her with respect. Shaman's from the world above must swim down to her to
comb her long black tangled hair. This calms Sedna down. Once this is done, she
releases her mammals to allow the Inuit to eat from the bounty of the sea. It
is for this reason in the north that after a hunter catches a seal he drops
water into the mouth of the mammal, a gesture to thank Sedna for her kindness
in allowing him to feed his family.
www.amiq.org/sedna.html
www.ancientpathway.com/godgoddess/sedna/sedna.html=====================================================================
Nasa finds new 'planet'
(Filed: 15/03/2004)
Nasa scientists believe they have discovered a new "planet" in the solar
system, after sightings by the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescope.
The body - named Sedna after the Inuit goddess of the ocean - has been found
orbiting the sun in a region of space known as the Kuiper Belt, which is 6.2
billion miles from Earth.
The object is believed to be about 1,250 miles across, but astronomers have
said it may even be larger than the furthest known planet, Pluto, which is
1,406 miles across and was discovered in 1930.
The "discovery of the most distant object ever detected orbiting the Sun" was
made by Dr
Michael Brown, associate professor of planetary astronomy at the
California Institute of Technology, in Pasadena, Nasa said.
Whether the new find can actually be called a planet is likely to be debated by
astro-physicists for months or even years to come.
Many bodies of rock and ice exist in the region and there is still some
argument over whether Pluto is a real "planet".
........................................
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