Nereid (moon)
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| Discovery | |
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| Discovered by: | Gerard P. Kuiper |
| Discovery date: | May 1, 1949 |
| Orbital characteristics | |
| Periapsis: | 1,353,600 km (0.00905 AU) |
| Apoapsis | 9,623,700 km (0.06433 AU) |
| Semi-major axis: | 5,513,400 km (0.03685 AU) |
| Eccentricity: | 0.7512 |
| Orbital period: | 360.1362 d |
| Avg. orbital speed: | 1.12 km/s |
| Inclination: | 5.07° (to Ecliptic) 32.55° (to Neptune's equator) 7.232° (to the local Laplace plane) |
| Satellite of: | Neptune |
| Physical characteristics | |
| Mean radius: | 170 km |
| Mass: | 3.1×1019 kg |
| Mean density: | 1.5 g/cm3 |
| Rotation period: | 0.48 d (11 h 31 min) |
| Albedo: | 0.14 |
| Temperature: | ~51 K mean (estimate) |
Nereid or Neptune II, is a moon of Neptune.
Nereid was found on 1 May 1949 by Gerard P. Kuiper, who suggested the name in the report of his discovery. It is named after the Nereids, sea-nymphs of Greek mythology.
It was the farthest of Neptune's known moons for a long time (Halimede through Neso have since taken that honour), and is the third biggest, with a diameter of 340 km. Its orbit averages 5,513,400 km in radius, but is very eccentric and varies from 1,353,600 to 9,623,700 kilometres. For a long time this was the most highly eccentric orbit of any known moon in the solar system, but it has found that Bestla, a recently discovered moon of Saturn has a more eccentric orbit. The unusual orbit suggests that it may be a captured asteroid or Kuiper belt object, or possibly that it was perturbed during the capture of Neptune's largest moon Triton. Very little else is known of Nereid.
Nereid was too far to be properly imaged by the Voyager 2 probe when it visited the Neptune system in 1989. Photos sent back show only its very non-spherical shape, and no surface features could be seen at the resolution available.
[change] Other websites
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| Moons | Naiad · Thalassa · Despina · Galatea · Larissa · Proteus · Triton · Nereid · Halimede · Sao · Laomedeia · Psamathe · Neso |  |
| Characteristics | Rings of Neptune · Great Dark Spot | |
| Discovery | John Couch Adams · Johann Gottfried Galle · William Lassell · Urbain Le Verrier | |
| Exploration | Voyager program · Voyager 2 | |
| Neptune Trojans | 2001 QR322 · 2004 UP10 · 2005 TN53 · 2005 TO74 · 2006 RJ103 · 2007 RW10 | |
