• Question: Why do all stars,galaxies,comets,asteroids,planets and blackholes have horrible names which include numbers and letters even though on the earth we have tornadoes and storms but they get named?

    Asked by KMB to Peter on 17 Nov 2016.
    • Photo: Peter Boorman

      Peter Boorman answered on 17 Nov 2016:

      That’s a brilliant question KMB!

      Names of things in space can usually tell you something about the thing itself. Many observatories name stuff after the instrument that was used to see it, and the either the date it was seen, or the coordinates of the thing in the sky. For example, ‘IRAS0019-794’ was imaged by the IRAS (or ‘InfraRed Astronomy Satellite’, and has coordinates 0019-794 in the sky.
      Other objects such as ‘SN2014’ tell you that this is a ‘SuperNova’, and was ‘imaged’ in 2014!

      Peter

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