While moonmoon is the Internet’s favorite title, other names like “submoon,” “moonlet,” and “moonito” have all been suggested.
Rebeeca Naden / Reuters / Illustration byQuartzA fake depiction of a moonmoon .
In 2014 , one astronomer ’s son require her a tough question : Can Moon have their own moon ? She was stump and decided to give the next few eld of her professional life to answering that very interrogation .
That astronomer was Juna Kollmeier of the Carnegie Institution Observatories , and alongside fellow uranologist Sean Raymond from the University of Bordeaux , she studied these “ submoons ” and lately published their finding in a paper onarXiv .
Rebeeca Naden/Reuters/Illustration byQuartzA fake depiction of a moonmoon.
The article titled “ Can Moons Have moon ? ” explores that question as well as the requirements that a moon and a submoon must have in guild to pull round long - terminal figure .
The scientific community has been abuzz on Twitter since the composition was bring out and has give many suggestions for likely names for the moon of a synodic month . The most democratic ? Moonmoon .
https://twitter.com/thejunaverse/status/1050156276607410176
Kevin M. Gill/NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSITitan orbiting Saturn.
accord toQuartz , no one has ever seen a moonmoon before . But , as the theme points out , just because no one has ever place middle on one does n’t mean that they do n’t survive . A moon that orbit another lunation which in turn orbits a planet would be a very rare occurrence because essentially — please excuse this space pun — all the stars would have to align .
The moonmoon would require to be very small and have a diam no larger than six mile . The lunar month it would orbit would postulate to be pretty big with a diameter openhanded than 620 mile . In plus to the size of it requisite , the theme says that there would want to be enough breakup between the moonmoon , the moonlight , and the planet they both revolve .
If the moon is too small or too stuffy to its host planet , it might suffer its moonmoon to tidal dissipation which would make it to be shredded to piece .
There are no moonmoons in our solar system , but there are a few moons that assemble the size and orbital space requirement : Titan and Iapetus , which orbit Saturn , Jupiter ’s moon Callisto , and Earth ’s lunation .
Kevin M. Gill / NASA / JPL - Caltech / SSITitan orbiting Saturn .
Furthermore , moonmoons can yield a circumstances of of import information about outer blank space and allow sixth sense into the development of planet and their moonshine .
“ We ’re really just scratching the surface here with how we can use the absence seizure of submoons to figure out our former chronicle , ” Kollmeier toldGizmodo .
The paper has yet to be peer refresh but several astronomers and members of the scientific community are excited about the potential source of information this study could tap into .
As unique as this raw research is , the term “ moonmoon ” has already made a name for itself separate from the composition .
In 2014 , a meme began spread on the Internet that featured aderpy - looking wolfcalled Moonmoon , and hoi polloi online have already caught onto the connecter between the scientific terminus and the lovable Hugo Wolf .
https://twitter.com/Julie_B92/status/1050065329760727041
The Moonmoon wolf meme has lived on for years and it looks like , thanks to the Internet , the delightfully simple and redundant name will stick around the scientific community as well .
Next , see why so many think thatthe moon landing place was bullshit . Then , take a facial expression at these awesome photos ofSaturn ’s largest moonshine , Titan .
