Controversial dwarf planet finally named 'Haumea'

It is a wonder we can make any forward motion in space scipnce when the people makning the discoveries are fighting amongst themselves.

After years of dispute, the last unnamed dwarf planet in the solar system has finally gotten a name. It will be called Haumea, after the goddess of childbirth and fertility in Hawaiian mythology.
The International Astronomical Union, which announced the new name on Wednesday, has struggled with naming the object, because two teams have laid claim to its discovery.

Finally some progress and yet another 'dwarf planet'. but it took some work to get there....

He says the controversy over this discovery is the worst since the early 17th century dispute over who found the four biggest satellites of Jupiter. The dispute was between Galileo and an astronomer named Simon Marius - Galileo ultimately won out.

This was cute though

This spin seems to come from a dramatic crash billions of years ago with another object in the distant Kuiper Belt, a ring of icy bodies beyond Neptune. That collision seems to have created Haumea's two moons, and at least 7 other icy descendents with the same orbit around the Sun, Brown says.
The IAU has credited Brown's team as the discoverer of Haumea's moons. These have been named Hi'iaka and Namaka after two of Haumea's children, which are said to have formed from parts of her body.

'Haumea'


[edit on 19/9/2008 by VIKINGANT]