The asteroid 130 Elektra has three moons , not two as antecedently thought , making it the center field of the first quadruple asteroid system ever reveal . Or to put it another direction , it has as many lunar month as all four intimate planets in our Solar System immix , quite the accomplishment since it is smaller than 47 American states .
Elektra is a main belt ammunition asteroid , with an orbit lasting 5.5 years . At 200 kilometer ( 120 miles ) across , it is no giant , but it ’s large enough to have been spotted in 1873 and tracked ever since . Its first moon was name in 2003 , but that was nothing unusual – it ’s common for asteroids to have a moonlight . A 2nd companion was distinguish in 2014 . However , since the more or less larger asteroidSylviahad already been evidence to have two moons nine years earlier , this was n’t in particular notable either .
Now inAstronomy and Astrophysics , a squad contribute byDr Anthony Berdeuof the National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand has reanalyzed data collected three day after the second synodic month discovery and announced the presence of S/2014 ( 130 ) 2 , a third moonshine . Eventually , a catchier name may be formally agnise .
The first lunar month , S/2003 ( 130 ) 1 , is 6 kilometers across and orbits Elektra at a length of around 1,300 km ( 810 miles ) . Although this is a close orbit , it ’s still distant enough to make it easy to spot . The 2nd and third satellites are standardized in size of it to each other ( 2.0 and 1.6 kilometers widely severally ) . The intellect S/2014 ( 130 ) 1 was detected from the 2014 observation at once while S/2014 ( 130 ) 2 took another seven years to ascertain is that the latest discovery orb nigher to Elektra , just 344 kilometers away on average . Being 15,000 times fainter , its luminosity is easily lose in Elektra ’s glare .
Indeed S/2014 ( 130 ) 2 is so close to Elektra that irregularities in the parent body ’s shape ( Elektra is far too small to be round ) falsify its already quite eccentric orbit . More remarably , the cranial orbit of the inner two moon overlap .
Some asteroid moon are caused when collision ping a clod off the parent consistence that never baffle far enough forth to run its gravity . That ’s likely to be the case for the first two synodic month , which both havesimilar spectra , and therefore piece , to Elektra itself . The same analytic thinking has yet to be done on S/2014 ( 130 ) 2 .
Dr Berdeu developed the data processing organisation used to find S/2014 ( 130 ) 2 for his Ph.D. and was applying it to Jupiter ’s moons when he noticed the same telescope had been observing Elektra around the same prison term . Having prove its worth , the technique could be deployed to find more moons around other asteroids .
NASA already hasone missionnamed after a Beatles song on its mode to chit-chat some asteroids . So far no plans have been herald to explore this fab four .
