Astronomers to Detail Aspects of Sedna (8 billion miles away, 400 below zero Fahrenheit)

Yahoo! News ^ | 3/15/04 | Andrew Bridges

[NormsRevenge]

LOS ANGELES - It is a frozen world more than 8 billion miles from Earth and believed to be the farthest known object within our solar system.

NASA (news - web sites) planned a Monday press conference to offer more details about Sedna, a planetoid between 800 miles and 1,100 miles in diameter, or about three-quarters the size of Pluto.

Named for the Inuit goddess who created the sea creatures of the Arctic, Sedna lies more than three times farther from the sun than Pluto. It was discovered in November.

"The sun appears so small from that distance that you could completely block it out with the head of a pin," said Mike Brown, an astronomer at the California Institute of Technology who led the NASA-funded team that found Sedna.

That makes Sedna the largest object found orbiting the sun since the discovery of Pluto, the ninth planet, in 1930. It trumps in size another world, called Quaoar, discovered by the same team in 2002.

Brown and his colleagues estimate the temperature on Sedna never rises above 400 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, making it the coldest known body in the solar system.

Sedna follows a highly elliptical path around the sun, a circuit that it takes 10,500 years to complete. Its orbit loops out as far as 84 billion miles from the sun, or 900 times the distance between the Earth and our star.

Brown and Chad Trujillo, of the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii, and David Rabinowitz, of Yale University, discovered Sedna on Nov. 14, 2003, using a 48-inch telescope at Caltech's Palomar Observatory east of San Diego.

Within days, other astronomers around the world trained their telescopes, including the recently launched Spitzer Space Telescope, on the object.

The team also have indirect evidence a tiny moon may trail Sedna, which is redder than all other known solar system bodies except Mars.

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On the Net:

Astronomy at the California Institute of Technology:

http://www.astro.caltech.edu

[NormsRevenge]

Sedna spelled backwards is Andes.

A chill wind blows on this planetoid. They should have named it after you now who. ;-)

[jwalburg]

Now we can have a new metaphor: as cold as Sedna

[theDentist]

It is a frozen world more than 8 billion miles from Earth and believed to be the farthest known object within our solar system.

Oh. I thought they were referring to the 9th Circuit Court.

[Jonah Hex]

Brown and his colleagues estimate the temperature on Sedna never rises above 400 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, making it the coldest known body in the solar system.

That reminds me, never ever forget to send your wife flowers on your anniversary.

[Grut]

...the NASA-funded team that found Sedna.

Named for the Inuit goddess...

So, the result of a federally-funded program is given a religious name. Hmm....

[skinkinthegrass]

They should have named it after you now who.

..she heard that, the one whose name, can't be said..she's SOoo EVIL....the Little Rock Mafia is near.

[xsrdx]

In all materials, a point is eventually reached at which all oscillations are the slowest they can possibly be. The temperature which corresponds to this point is called absolute zero. Note that the oscillations never come to a complete stop, even at absolute zero.

Absolute Zero is minus 459 deg F; minus 400 is pretty chilly.

Probably never get your tongue unstuck from the flagpole on Senda.

[COBOL2Java]

This from a website detailing Inuit Beliefs:

One of the most powerful spirit beings was the sea goddess, variously known as Sedna, Taleelayo or Nuliayuk. From her home at the bottom of the sea, she controlled the weather, powerful spirits and sea creatures. Rules and taboos had to be obeyed lest this powerful being become enraged and cause storms, sickness and starvation.

Hmmm. Description and picture kinda remind me of a certain senator...

[jwalburg]

Do you think this is something other than Sedna? I thought this post was the answer to the mysterious object hinted at yesterday. Am I wrong? I guess we'll find out at the conference.

[axel f]

So, the result of a federally-funded program is given a religious name. Hmm....

The left shouldn't have a problem with it though because it's not Christian.

[George from New England]

How far in light time is it?

Earth is 8 minutes from the sun by light.

The Moon is about 2 seconds away from Earth.

[mhking]

So is Sedna the tenth planet, or the eleventh planet?

[calljack]

Yeah, I thought they discovered one a while ago and called it Vulcan. Really. No...Yes...???

[mhking]

They should have named it after you now who.

Nope.

Though the joke wouldn't be lost on Her Shrillness, her supporters and all the DUmmies would be clueless, and vaunt it as the "sign" they were all looking for which fortells her reign over the "evil ones" (translation: us real people)...

Just damn.

If you want on the list, FReepmail me. This IS a high-volume PING list...

[PBRSTREETGANG]

So is Sedna the tenth planet, or the eleventh planet?

I thought that some organizations had downgraded Pluto and that, in some circles, we didn't even have nine planets anymore.

[Verginius Rufus]

Inuit goddess, my foot. I've never met an Eskimo who worshipped any goddess named Sedna. (Admittedly, I've never met an Eskimo.) The name was coined by misspelling an Arizona place name (as someone on FR pointed out yesterday)...Sedna is from Sedona. If the tiny moon is verified, they can call it Yum.

[smokinleroy]

"The sun appears so small from that distance that you could completely block it out with the head of a pin,"

Not to nitpick, here, but this is meaningless information. You could block out the sun with the head of a pin from Earth if the pin is close enough to your eye.

[eno_]

About 2 hours.

[NormsRevenge]

The FR crowd is a very unforgiving crowd, indeed. LOL Thanks. :-)