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Psamathe (moon)

Adapted from Wikipedia · Discoverer experience

Animation showing the discovery of Neptune's moon Psamathe taken by a telescope in 2010.

Psamathe, also known as Neptune X, is a small moon that orbits the planet Neptune. It was discovered in 2003 by astronomers Scott S. Sheppard and David C. Jewitt using the large Subaru Telescope. Before it received its official name in 2007, it was called S/2003 N 1.

Animation of Psamathe moving in images by Very Large Telescope on 13 July 2010

This moon is not very big, with a diameter of about 38 kilometers. It travels around Neptune at a great distance, between 25.7 and 67.7 million kilometers away. It takes almost 25 Earth years to complete one orbit around Neptune.

Psamathe's orbit is special because it moves in the opposite direction compared to most of Neptune's other moons. Scientists think that Psamathe and another moon called Neso might have come from the same bigger moon that broke apart long ago. Both of these moons are much farther from Neptune than most other moons in our solar system.

Images

A stunning view of the planet Jupiter and its four largest moons—Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto—taken by the Voyager 1 spacecraft.
A colorful view of the dwarf planet Pluto and its large moon Charon, showing their diverse surface features as captured by NASA's New Horizons spacecraft.
An image of asteroid 243 Ida and its moon Dactyl taken by the Galileo spacecraft, showing details of the asteroid's surface and composition.
A colorful image of the planet Neptune taken by NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft in 1989.
Astronomers using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii captured these images of Neptune's moon Psamathe, showing its movement over time.

Related articles

Neptune
David C. Jewitt

This article is a child-friendly adaptation of the Wikipedia article on Psamathe (moon), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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