Naming Pluto’s Moons: Will it Come Down to Trekkies Versus the IAU?

(Before It's News)

The path of New Horizons through Pluto’s growing family. (Image Credit: NASA/ESA/A. Field STScl).

As reported here on Universe Today last week, the SETI Institute has invited the public to vote on the names of Pluto’s 4^th and 5^th moons. Discovered in 2011 and 2012 respectively, researcher and co-discoverer Mark Showalter will take these names before the International Astronomical Union (IAU) after voting closes on February 25^th, 2013.

But days after the polling opened, a curious twist in the tale occurred that Star Trek’s Mr. Spock would only describe as “Fascinating.”
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Read the rest of Naming Pluto’s Moons: Will it Come Down to Trekkies Versus the IAU? (818 words)

© David Dickinson for Universe Today, 2013. |
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Post tags: Clyde Tombaugh, discovery of pluto, naming p4/p5, naming plutos moons, orcus vanth, pluto vulcan

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