[meteorite-list] Pluto Added To Official 'Minor Planet' List

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Sep 7 17:43:47 2006
Message-ID: <200609072143.OAA19989_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article/dn10028-pluto-added-to-official-minor-planet-list.html

Pluto added to official "minor planet" list
David Shiga
New Scientist
07 September 2006

Pluto will henceforth be known as minor planet 134340 Pluto, according
to a new designation by the International Astronomical Union's Minor
Planet Center.

The decision to include Pluto among the many asteroids and comets in the
minor planet catalog makes official the icy body's recent - and highly
controversial - demotion from planethood.

Pluto's status was changed from "planet" to "dwarf planet" at a meeting
of the IAU in Prague on 24 August. Many astronomers are unhappy with the
new planet definition that excludes Pluto and some of them are
organising a conference to come up with an alternative definition (see
Astronomers plot to overturn planet definition
<http://www.newscientistspace.com/article/dn9890-astronomers-plot-to-overturn-planet-definition.html>).

But the official catalog of small bodies in the solar system is under
the authority of the IAU, and it recently added Pluto to its list of
minor planets.

Tim Spahr, the interim director of the IAU's Minor Planet Center (MPC)
in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, says this was done for the sake of
consistency. That is because the IAU decided that Ceres, an asteroid
already in the minor planet catalog, is also a "dwarf planet".

Spahr says the IAU will soon create a new catalog of dwarf planets.
"Ceres is already in the minor planet catalog, so the simplest thing is
to put these in the minor planet catalog and the dwarf planet catalog,"
he told New Scientist.

'Scientific heresy'

Initially, there will be three objects in the dwarf planet catalog:
Pluto, Ceres, and the distant object 2003 UB313, which is unofficially
named Xena. The IAU will decide on an official name for 2003 UB313 in a
month or two, he says.

An IAU working group is being set up to decide whether any other objects
qualify for the dwarf planet list. Other Pluto-like objects, such as
2005 FY9, will be considered for membership, Spahr says.

Not everyone has been quick to adopt the new planet definition, however.
On the day of the IAU decision, two members of the California state
assembly introduced a resolution condemning the "mean-spirited" IAU for
its decision on Pluto, calling it "a hasty, ill-considered scientific
heresy".

Introduced by Keith Richman and Joseph Canciamilla, the resolution says
the fact that Pluto shares its name with the dog made famous in Disney
cartoons gives it "a special connection to California history and culture".

"Downgrading Pluto's status will cause psychological harm to some
Californians who question their place in the universe and worry about
the instability of universal constants," it adds.

On a more serious note, Alan Stern, project leader for NASA's New
Horizons mission to Pluto, says the project will not recognise the new
IAU definition. "We will continue to refer to Pluto as the ninth
planet," he says on the mission's website. "I think most of you will
agree with that decision and cheer us on."
Received on Thu 07 Sep 2006 05:43:22 PM PDT