Washington, United States – A research team led by the Southwest Research Institute announced the discovery of a new, unknown moon orbiting the planet Uranus.
This brings the number of known moons of this planet to 29.
NASA said the moon was detected during a telescopic observation conducted on February 2, 2025.
“This small moon was observed in a series of 10 40-minute images, using a near-infrared camera (NIRCam),” explained Mariam Al-Moatamed, lead scientist in the Department of Solar System Science and Exploration at the Southwest Research Institute.
She added, “This discovery is considered important. Especially since the Voyager 2 spacecraft did not see it while flying next to Uranus about 40 years ago”.
She continued: “Thanks to its high accuracy and sensitivity to infrared rays, the James Webb Telescope provides an unprecedented ability. It can detect distant and faint objects that were previously outside the scope of observation”.
Knowledge of the complex structures
She stressed that this discovery reflects modern astronomy’s continued development of our knowledge of the complex structures of the outer solar system.
The diameter of the new moon is estimated at about 10 kilometers. This size makes it smaller and weaker in light than the smallest previously known inner moons.
This explains why it was not seen by the Voyager 2 probe and previous telescopes.
Matthew Tiscarino, a member of the Citi Institute’s research team, pointed out that Uranus has the largest number of small inner moons compared to other planets.
He added that the complex relationship between these moons and Uranus’ rings indicates a chaotic history. In this history, the ring system overlaps with the moon system.
The new moon is the fourteenth member of the group of small moons. These orbit near Uranus’ large moons such as Miranda and Ariel.
The discovered moon is located about 56,000 kilometers from the center of Uranus, between the orbits of Ophelia and Bianca.
It orbits in a semi-circular orbit, indicating that it originated near its current location.
