Prospero (moon)

Prospero (pros'-pər-oe, IPA: /ˈprɒspəroʊ/) is a relatively small retrograde irregular satellite of Uranus discovered on 1999-07-18 by the astrophysicist Matthew Holman and his team, and given the provisional designation S/1999 U 3. Confirmed as Uranus XVIII it was named after the sorcerer Prospero in William Shakespeare's play The Tempest.

The orbital parameters suggest that it may belong, together with Sycorax and Setebos to the same dynamic cluster, suggesting common origin.^[3] However, this suggestion does not appear to be supported by the observed colours. The satellite appears neutral (grey) in the visible light (colour indices B-V=0.80, R-V=0.39)^[4] , similar to Setebos but different from Sycorax (which is light red).

References

^ Jacobson, R.A. (2003) URA066 (2007-Jun-28). Planetary Satellite Mean Orbital Parameters. JPL/NASA. Retrieved on 2008-01-23.
^ ^a ^b ^c Scott S. Sheppard, David C. Jewitt, and Jan Kleyna An Ultradeep Survey for Irregular Satellites of Uranus: Limits to Completeness, The Astronomical Journal, 129 (2005), pages 518–525 . Preprint
^ Grav, Tommy; Holman, Matthew J.; Gladman, Brett J.; Aksnes, Kaare Photometric survey of the irregular satellites,Icarus, 166,(2003), pp. 33-45. Preprint
^ Tommy Grav, Matthew J. Holman, and Wesley C. Fraser Photometry of Irregular Satellites of Uranus and Neptune,The Astrophysical Journal, 613, (2004), pp. L77–L80. Preprint

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Characteristics	Atmosphere · Rings of Uranus · Moons
Discovery	William Herschel · William Lassell
Exploration	Voyager program · Voyager 2
Other	15 Orionis · Uranus-crosser asteroid · In fiction