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The Largest Kuiper Belt Object Isn't Pluto Or Eris, But Triton

Posted by Soulskill on from the also-not-a-planet dept.

StartsWithABang writes: Out beyond Neptune, the last of our Solar System's gas giants, the icy graveyard of failed planetesimals lurks: the Kuiper Belt. Among these mixes of ice, snow, dust and rock are a number of worlds — possibly a few hundred — massive enough to pull themselves into hydrostatic equilibrium. The most famous among them are Pluto, the first one ever discovered, and Eris, of comparable size but undoubtedly more massive. But there's an even larger, more massive object from the Kuiper Belt than either of these, yet you never hear about it: it's Triton, the largest moon of Neptune, a true Kuiper Belt object!

3 of 61 comments (clear)

  1. Of course we've heard about it by almitydave · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I hear about it. I remember hearing a while ago that Triton was theorized to be a captured Kuiper belt object. It's one of the "big moons", and it has ice volcanoes. How cool is that?

    Sure, we don't hear about it a lot, because it's so far out, so there isn't a high rate of discovery like planets that have been probed.

    --
    my, your, his/her/its, our, your, their
    I'm, you're, he's/she's/it's, we're, you're, they're
  2. No it isn't by Spy+Handler · · Score: 5, Funny

    Triton was a Kuiper belt object. Now it's not.

    How long must the discrimination go on? Surely a billion years is enough to qualify for Neptunian citizenship?

  3. Re:Does the rock run Linux? by WilliamGeorge · · Score: 4, Informative

    Actually, its name is mythological in origin (like most bodies in our solar system):

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...

    --
    William George