In the solar system, both Saturn and Jupiter have a large number of satellites, so who has more satellites?Recently, scientists confirmed as many as 128 newly discovered moons around Saturn, bringing the total number to 274. By comparison, Jupiter has 95 moons, the gap between the two widened rapidly. However, these newly discovered satellites of Saturn are not large.Only a few kilometers in diameter, like an asteroid.
At the same time, they are not regular spheres,They are generally irregular in shape, some are like potatoes., called irregular satellites in astronomy.
In fact, these small satellites may have originally been asteroids or satellites. They were captured by Saturn's strong gravity in the early days of the solar system. After that, they experienced a series of collisions and fragmentations over the long years, forming the large-scale satellite group today.
Of course, more small satellites will almost certainly be discovered in the future, and the ownership of the "king of satellites in the solar system" may also change.
Among the named moons of Saturn,Titan is the largest moon with a diameter of 5,150 kilometers, second only to Ganymede. It is the first satellite discovered to have an atmosphere. The density of the atmosphere is five times that of the Earth. The main components are nitrogen and methane, and the surface is viscous hydrocarbons. It was once people's hope of finding extraterrestrial life, but space exploration has denied it.
There are also six medium-sized satellites with diameters ranging from 400 to 1500 kilometers, and the rest are less than 300 kilometers.
Among the satellites of Jupiter,Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto were discovered by Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei in 1610 using a homemade telescope, and were later known as the Galilean satellites.
The other satellites are much fainter than the Galilean satellites and require larger telescopes to see them.
American astronomer Barnard discovered Io with a telescope in 1892, moving within the orbit of Io.