Haumea

About Haumea in brief

Haumea is a dwarf planet located beyond Neptune’s orbit. It is probably the third-largest known trans-Neptunian object, after Eris and Pluto. Its mass is about one-third that of Pluto, and 11400 that of Earth. In October 2017, astronomers announced the discovery of a ring system around Haumea. Two teams claim credit for the discovery, though the latter claim has been contested. On September 17, 2008, it was named after Haumesa, the Hawaiian goddess of childbirth, under the expectation by the International Astronomical Union that it would prove to be a dwarf planets. HaumeA’s elongated shape together with its rapid rotation, rings, and high albedo, are thought to be the consequences of a giant collision, which left HaUMEa the largest member of a collisional family that includes several large trans-Nepunian objects. It has two known moons, Hiʻiaka and Namaka, and is believed to have a third moon, Mauna Kea, which is located in the Hawaiian island of Oahu. It was discovered in 2004 by a team headed by Mike Brown of Caltech at the Palomar Observatory in the U.S. and independently in 2005 by José Luis Ortiz Moreno at the Sierra Nevada Observatory in Spain. The Spanish team were the first to file a claim for discovery to the Minor Planet Center, in July 2005. In September 2006, the Caltech team submitted formal names from Hawaiian mythology to the IAU for both 2003EL61 and its moons, in order to pay homage to the place where the satellites were discovered.

The names were proposed by David Rabinowitz of Yale University and Chad Trujillo of Gemini Observatory in Hawaii. On July 29, 2005, Haume a was given the provisional designation 2003 EL61. On December 7, 2006, and admitted into the official minor planet catalog at the time by the Kuiper belt, the planet was given its official designation of 2003 EL 61. The IAU announcement on September 17,. 2008, that Haumei had been named by dual committee established for bodies expected to be dwarf planets, did not mention a discoverer. The Caltech proposal was the chosen name; Ortiz’s team had proposed \”Ataecina\”, the ancient Iberian goddess of spring, which as a chthonic deity would have been appropriate for a plutino. Until it was given a permanent name, theCaltech discovery team used the nickname “Santa” among themselves, because they had discovered Haumeo on December 28, 2004, just after Christmas. The name Haumee is the matron goddess of the island of Hawaii, where the MaunaKea Observatory is located, and Papa Kea is the name of the Hawaiian god of childbirth. In addition, she is identified with Papa Papa, who is located the same way as the Cal tech team’s discovery of Haumeu in 2003.