Sycorax (moon)
Animation of discovery images taken by the Hale Telescope in September 1997 | |
| Discovery | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | |
| Discovery site | Hale Telescope at Palomar Obs. |
| Discovery date | 6 September 1997 |
| Designations | |
Designation | Uranus XVII |
| Pronunciation | /ˈsɪkɒræks/ |
Named after | Sycorax |
| S/1997 U 2 | |
| Adjectives | Sycoraxian /sɪkɒˈræksiən/ |
| Orbital characteristics | |
| Epoch 31 July 2016 (JD 2457600.5) | |
| Observation arc | 32.37 yr (11,815 d) |
| Earliest precovery date | 2 June 1984 |
| 12,193,230 km (0.0815067 AU) | |
| Eccentricity | 0.4841889 |
| 3.52 yr (1,286.28 d) | |
| 160.58731° | |
| 0° 16m 47.56s / day | |
| Inclination | 153.22796° (to the ecliptic) 159.403° (to local Laplace plane) |
| 258.56478° | |
| 16.29680° | |
| Satellite of | Uranus |
| Physical characteristics | |
| 157+23 −15 km 165+36 −42 km | |
| Mass | ~2.5×1018 kg (estimate) |
Mean density | ~1.3 g/cm3 (assumed) |
| 6.9162±0.0013 hr (double-peaked) 3.6 hr (single-peaked) | |
| Albedo | 0.065+0.015 −0.011 0.049+0.038 −0.017 |
| Temperature | ~65 K (mean estimate) |
| 20.8 (V) | |
| 7.5±0.04 7.83±0.06 | |
Sycorax /ˈsɪkɒræks/ is the largest irregular satellite of Uranus. It was discovered in September, 1997 on the Hale Telescope in California. Sycorax's orbit is retrograde, irregular, and much more distant than that of Oberon, the furthest of Uranus's regular moons. With a diameter of over 150 kilometres (93 mi), it is the largest irregular moon of Uranus. It has been hypothesized that Sycorax is a captured object, as opposed to one formed with Uranus.