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*Ahem* from http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/
" 2003 VB12 is the official temporary designation of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) Minor Planet Center, based on the year (2003) and date (14 Nov = the 22nd 2-week period of the year thus V=the 22nd letter of the alphabet. after that it is sequential based on the discovery announcement) of discovery. Once the orbit of 2003 VB12 is known well enough (probably 1 year), we will reccomend to the IAU Committee on Small Body Nomenclature -- which is responsible for solar system names -- that it be permanently called Sedna. Our newly discovered object is the coldest most distant place known in the solar system, so we feel it is appropriate to name it in honor of Sedna, the Inuit goddess of the sea, who is thought to live at the bottom of the frigid arctic ocean. We will furthermore suggest to the IAU that newly discoverd objects in this inner Oort cloud all be named after entities in arctic mythologies."
Also if they're going to name all the objects of this size in the Oort cloud they're going to run out of names from just one patheon pretty quickly. Also why not because it sounds cool?
Update - from http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~chad/2004dw/ about another object found by the same team.
"After the object is numbered, then the discoverers (that's us) have one decade to propose a name to the Internation Astronomical Union. There are even more rules about the name of the object. 2004 DW, for instance, must be named after an underworld deity because it is in a Pluto-like orbit." |
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