About International Astronomical Union:
- The International Astronomical Union (IAU) is a non-governmental organisation that works to advance astronomy. It was founded in 1919 and is headquartered in Paris, France.
- Primary functionsof IAU:
- Promoting astronomical research, communication, education, and development through international cooperation.
- Assigning designations and names to celestial bodies (stars, planets, asteroids, etc.) and any surface features on them.
- Establishing standards for astronomical observation and data.
- The IAU is a member of the International Science Council (ISC). It has over 12,000 individual members from more than 100 countries.
Planetary Nomenclature:
- Planetary nomenclature is used to uniquely identify a feature on the surface of a planet or satellite so that it can be easily located, described, and discussed.
- IAU is the internationally recognised authority for assigning names to planetary surface features. It follows some rules and conventions to do so.
- The IAU’s Rule 9 states: “No names having political, military or religious significance may be used, except for names of political figures prior to the 19th century.”
Key Facts:
- Recently, IAU’s working group for Planetary System Nomenclature has approved the name “Statio Shiv Shakti” for the landing site of Chandrayaan-3’s Vikram lander.
- Recently, IAU has named an asteroid after an Indian astro-scientist Prof. Jayant Murthy for his contributions to astronomy, especially to the New Horizons mission. His team’s endeavour to observe ultraviolet background radiation in the outer Solar System, where the interference from the Sun and interplanetary medium is minimal, have played a crucial role in broadening understanding of cosmic phenomena.
- New Horizons is an interplanetary space probe launched by NASA's in 2006.
- It is the first spacecraft to explore Pluto, flying by the dwarf planet and its moons on July 14, 2015.
- In early 2019, New Horizons flew past its second major target – Arrokoth, the most distant object ever explored up close. (Arrokoth is a trans-Neptunian object located in the Kuiper belt)
Asteroid Belt:
- Asteroids are rocky remnants from the early formation of our solar system (about 4.6 billion years ago) that mainly orbit the Sun between Mars and Jupiter.
- The asteroid belt is a nearly flat ring that contains millions of asteroids, ranging in size from less than 10 metres to 530 kms (The largest asteroid is Ceres, which is about one-quarter the size of Earth’s moon).