Six moons of Neptune discovered by the Voyager 2 spacecraft in 1989 have been named after water nymphs and children and lovers of the mythological Greek sea god Poseidon, an official said Friday.
A recently discovered moon of Saturn was named Pan after the flute-playing Greek god of fields and shepherds who was half man and half goat.The planet Neptune is named for the Roman god of the sea, known to the ancient Greeks as Poseidon.
The six Neptunian moons discovered by Voyager 2 were named Naiad and Galatea, both water nymphs; Thalassa and Larissa, both lovers of Poseidon; Proteus, one of the god's sons; and Despina, a daughter.
The names were revealed this week in a telegram issued by the International Astronomical Union's Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams, a Cambridge, Mass., reporting agency for astronomy discoveries.
The IAU's executive committee voted to approve the names when it met Aug. 2 in Buenos Aires, said astronomer Brian Marsden, the bureau's director.
Saturn's newest moon, which the group named Pan, was discovered hidden among the planet's rings by Mark Showalter, a scientist at
NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif.
Showalter found the 12-mile-wide moon on July 2, 1990, when he was analyzing pictures of Saturn taken by Voyagers 1 and 2 when the twin spacecraft explored the planet in 1980 and 1981.
Voyagers 1 and 2, laden with TV cameras and instruments, were launched from Florida in 1977.