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Planet

Eris

Dwarf planet

Eris

Most massive dwarf planet

Photo: NASA/ESA/CSA JWST NIRCam; Ana Carolina de Souza Feliciano et al. & Melina Thévenot · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Eris is the most massive and second-largest-known dwarf planet in the Solar System. It is a trans-Neptunian object (TNO) in the scattered disk and has a high-eccentricity orbit. Eris was discovered in January 2005 by a Palomar Observatory–based team led by Mike Brown and verified later that year. It was named in September 2006 after the Greco-Roman goddess of strife and discord. Eris is the ninth-most massive known object orbiting the Sun and the sixteenth-most massive in the Solar System. It is also the largest-known object in the Solar System that has not been visited by a spacecraft. Eris has been measured at 2,326 ± 12 kilometres (1,445 ± 7 mi) in diameter; its mass is 0.28% that of the Earth and 27% greater than that of Pluto, although Pluto is slightly larger by volume. Both Eris and Pluto have a surface area that is comparable to that of Russia or South America.

Description from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).

Key facts

Distance

Outer solar system

Mean radius

1,163 km

Orbital period

560 years

Discovered

2003 · Michael E. Brown

Did you know

Read more on Wikipedia

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