Scientists discover 12 new moons orbiting close to Jupiter

No less than twelve new moons orbiting Jupiter have been discovered by scientists.

While the research team has suspected the existence of these 12 moons for about a year, it takes several observations in order to confirm that an object is, in fact, orbiting Jupiter. As such, the team took their time in confirming the new Jovian moons.

Scientists made their latest discovery when they were actually looking for another extraterrestrial body — Planet X, the planet that is suspected to exist somewhere beyond Pluto.

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“Jupiter just happened to be in the sky near the search fields where we were looking for extremely distant solar system objects, so we were serendipitously able to look for new moons around Jupiter while at the same time looking for planets at the fringes of our solar system,” team leader Scott S. Sheppard said in an announcement. Of the 12 new moons discovered, 11 are described as normal moons, while the other is an “oddball.”

What makes it weird? Apparently, it’s just 1 kilometer wide, which means it’s the smallest moon scientists have discovered to date orbiting the planet, and it takes a full year and a half to make a complete trip around Jupiter.

Moreover, its orbit crosses that of other moons in retrograde (those that travel in the opposite direction of Jupiter’s rotation), which is to say that at some point, multiple moons could collide. “This is an unstable situation,” Sheppard noted. “Head-on collisions would quickly break apart and grind the objects down to dust.”

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