Faraway places in the solar system

Are you curious to know what the farthest places in the solar system are? This article will list for you the names of the farthest places in the solar system .

 

You may have heard of the Sea of ​​Tranquility, the lunar 'sea' used as the landing site for the Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle on July 20, 1969. You may also have heard of some of the other seas on the Moon, such as the Sea of ​​Vapors, the Sea of ​​Clouds, and the Ocean of Storms. But what about the Sea of ​​Wisdom, the Sea of ​​Crisis, and the Sea of ​​Abundance? Or the Lake of Oblivion, the Lake of Hate, and the Swamp of Decay?

But it doesn't stop there. As the solar system has become more explored and photographed, all sorts of geographical features have been mapped on many of our planets and moons from Mercury to Neptune. The official names for all of these features are governed and approved by an organization called the International Astronomical Union, or IAU, which has established a strict set of rules, conventions, and guidelines for how these features are designated. Here are some of the far-flung places in the solar system that have been recognized.

 

Alcott // Venus

Since Venus is named after one of the most important goddesses of Roman mythology, almost all of the planet's geographical features are also named after women, gods, and other famous female figures.

Alcott is a 64km-wide crater in the planet's southern hemisphere, named after Little Women author Louisa May Alcott. Novelists Jane Austen, Anaïs Nin, Ayn Rand, Dorothy L. Sayers, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Edith Wharton also have craters on Venus named after them.

Beagle // Mercury

Mercury's rocky and cratered surface is marked by a number of cliffs and vast abysses known in astronomical terms as rupis (from the Latin word for "cliff"). All of Mercury's rupis are named after famous exploration ships, including Beagle, discovered in 2008, named after Charles Darwin's research ship HMS Beagle.

Elsewhere on Mercury, you can find rupis named Adventure, Discovery, Resolution and Endeavour (all named after Captain Cook's ships), Fram (named after the ship used by Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen on his Antarctic expedition in 1910).

 

Beethoven // Mercury

All impact craters on Mercury are named after deceased artists, writers, composers, musicians or people of similar artistic and creative character who, according to IAU regulations, must have been at least three years old and recognized as having been of international importance in their particular field for at least half a century.

Beethoven, which is about 643km wide, is one of the largest impact craters on Mercury and one of the largest in the entire solar system. Other names include Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Debussy, Haydn, Mozart, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Vivaldi and Wagner.

Clackmannan // Mathilde (Asteroid Belt)

Clackmannan is the name of a small town in the Scottish Lowlands about 35 miles from Edinburgh, but it is also the name of an impact crater on Mathilde, a medium-sized asteroid orbiting the Sun in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Mathilde is dark and carbonaceous, so all of its surface features are named after places and regions on Earth known for coal production—and Clackmannan, once one of Scotland's leading coal mining towns, was honored by the IAU in 2000.

Galahad // Mimas (Moon of Saturn)

Mimas is Saturn's seventh-largest moon, but at just under 250 miles (402 kilometers) in diameter, it's still only about one-eighth the size of the Moon — if laid out flat, its entire surface would cover an area the size of Spain. Geographic features on Mimas are traditionally named after characters from Arthurian legend, including Bedivere, Galahad, Gwynevere, Launcelot, Merlin, Mordred, and Percivale.

McAuliffe // Earth's Moon

As of 2015, the names of more than 1,500 craters on our Moon's surface have been approved by the IAU, most of which commemorate scientists, astronomers, and explorers who have made exceptional contributions to their respective fields. However, about a dozen craters have been dedicated to astronauts and cosmonauts who have lost their lives in the pursuit of space exploration—including McAuliffe, an 18km-wide impact crater on the far side of the Moon. It is named after Christa McAuliffe, a teacher and civilian astronaut who was one of the seven crew members who tragically lost their lives in the 1986 Challenger disaster.

Her six fellow crew members are also commemorated by the names of craters on the Moon, as are the ill-fated crew of Apollo 1, who died in a fire at Cape Canaveral in 1967, and the astronauts from Soyuz 1 and 11 who died in re-entry accidents in 1967 and 1971.