NASA's Webb telescope discovers new moon orbiting Uranus
The diameter of the satellite is estimated to be only some 10 km
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NASA announced that the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has discovered a new, 29th satellite of Uranus, which was named S/2025 U1.
According to NASA, a team led by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) identified the previously unknown moon orbiting Uranus during a Webb observation on February 2, 2025, expanding the planet's known satellite family to 29.
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The diameter of the satellite is estimated to be only some 10 km. The satellite's small size prevented NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft from spotting it in 1986.
Maryame El Moutamid, a lead scientist in SwRI's Solar System Science and Exploration Division, said, "It's a small moon, but a significant discovery, which is something that even NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft didn't see during its flyby nearly 40 years ago."
S/2025 U1 orbits Uranus at a distance of about 56,000 km and will be given another name at a later stage.
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