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Tech

Pluto's Newly-Named Moons Sound Kinda Evil

Remember that contest to name P4 and P5, the recently discovered moons of Pluto? The International Astronomical Union has announced that it's officially adopted the names picked in the online contest, and grab some leather pants, because they're pretty metal: the moons are now known as Kerberos, the three-headed dog of Greek mythology, and Styx, that band you got really into in college after watching too many Adam Sandler movies.

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Aside from the darkest planet ever discovered, Pluto and its moons are pretty much the most metal (metal as in \m/, not elemental) celestial bodies around. Pluto, of course, is one name for the Greek god of the underworld, and the rest of Pluto's moons all have hellish roots. Charon is the guy who ferried souls across the river Styx, Nix is the goddess of the night, and Hydra is an uber-poisonous, multi-headed water beast. Not even Mars, god of war, can compete with that.

The two moons were discovered in 2011 and 2012 by astronomers working with the Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, and neither is particularly large. Kerberos is estimated to be between 13-34 kilometers in diameter, and Styx 10-25 kilometers. (The range is because it's hard to view a nearly-dark object that, at minimum, is more than 4 billion kilometers away.)

William Shatner, for one, is bummed that one of the moons wasn't named Vulcan. I, however, am pumped, because finally we've got a pair of celestial bodies to pay home to such incredible musical acts as this:

And this (Cerberus is an Anglicized version of Kerberos):

@derektmead