Haumea: The dwarf planet named after the Hawaiian goddess of fertility
As we all know, the world of science was taken by storm when Pluto was demoted to the position of a dwarf planet in 2006. Since then, geography books worldwide have sadly excluded the previously known coldest planet as part of the solar system. However, the good news is, that this announcement made way for other dwarf planets in our solar system to come into limelight. One such dwarf planet is 136108 Haumea, simply called Haumea. Discovered in 2004 by American astronomer Mike Brown and his team, it is located in the outer solar system. However, it wasn’t until 2008 that the International Astronomical Union recognised this dwarf planet. That’s how the successor of Pluto was born! So, let us throw some light on what’s known about Haumea so far.
Haumea at a glance
Haumea is almost the same size as Pluto and is oblong-shaped. It is also 1920 kilometres in length, 1500 kilometres in width and 990 kilometres in thickness. It rotates on its own axis once every four hours, making it the fastest rotating large object in our entire solar system! Haumea takes nearly 285 Earth years to complete one revolution around the Sun. It has a mass of approximately one-third that of Pluto’s. In fact, since it exhibits Pluto-like properties, such as ice-rock composition, having its own moons and unique position, it is often regarded as a plutoid (belonging to the same group as Pluto). Thanks to its propeller-like ever-spinning motion, it appears oblong like a football. Scientists believe that it was born out of a collision between two other planetary objects.
A planet named after a goddess
As per the guidelines set forth by the International Astronomical Union, astronomers who discover space or planetary objects get the opportunity of naming them as well. Accordingly, Mike Brown named his discovery Haumea, after the Goddess of fertility Haumea, according to Hawaiian mythology. This was done as a tribute to Hawaii, where it was discovered. In 2005, astronomers discovered her moons too and named them after Haumea’s daughters to continue the tradition!
Haumea’s moons
So far, Haumea has two known moons, named 136108 Haumea I Hi’iaka and 136108 Haumea II Namaka. Both were discovered together soon after Haumea’s own discovery by the same team of astronomers led by Brown near Hawaii. Hi'iaka is the patron goddess of the island of Hawaii while Namaka is a water spirit as per Hawaiian mythology. While Hi’iaka is the outermost moon with an ice surface and is presumed to have been a fragment of the original Haumea, Namaka is situated closer to Haumea. While the former is 310 kilometres across, the latter is only 170 kilometres across. Furthermore, Hi’iaka takes 49 days to orbit Haumea, while it takes Namaka only 18 days to do the dame. In addition to the moons, Haumea is also said to have a visible ring around it.