Makemake is the name of the deity who created the culture of Easter Island. The same name is given to a very distant dwarf planet, one of the largest objects in the so-called Kuiper Belt, on the edge solar system, orbiting 5.7-7.9 billion kilometers around the Sun.

Makemake is one of the five officially recognized dwarf planets in the solar system. In addition to Ceres, in the asteroid belt this category also includes the ex-planet Pluto, Haumea and Eris. All of them are located in the so-called Kuiper Belt - a ring of millions of icy objects behind the planet Neptune. The smallest of them are comets that are at rest, the largest are entire worlds, such as Pluto with its diameter of 2300 km.

Until now, little was known about Makemak, discovered in 2005, shortly after Easter, and therefore named after the Easter Island deity. Jose Luis Ortiz and his colleagues were able to observe using five telescopes in South America the so-called occultation, when this dwarf planet passed for a few minutes in front of one of the stars in the Milky Way. In such cases, many properties of distant objects can be determined quite accurately, such as radius, temperature and the presence of an atmosphere.

What is Makemake?

Cold, small and naked - here basic properties this dwarf planet. A team of astronomers led by José Luis Ortiz was able to determine some of its characteristics in more detail for the first time. According to them, Makemake is brighter than Pluto, has a slightly flattened shape, but there is no general atmosphere. Perhaps some areas of the surface could emit gases and thereby locally create a thin atmosphere, the researchers suggested.

Measurements have shown that this celestial body is not ideal round ball. The dwarf planet at the equator is somewhat thicker: the diameter is 1500 km, at the poles it is only 1430 km. Surface temperatures average 30 degrees above absolute zero, in some places it is 50 degrees Kelvin, but there are places where it is a little warmer. Warmer areas, according to Albedo researchers, are likely darker than the rest of the surface. In terms of brightness, this planet resembles dirty snow - it is brighter than Pluto, but much darker than the brilliant white Eris. Density of 1.7 grams per cubic centimeter, indicates that Makemake is a mixture of ice and rock.

The most surprising feature of this dwarf planet, however, is its high reflection. sunlight. "It reflects about 77 percent of the light that hits it. Most other objects of this kind do not even reach ten percent of this value," said Ortiz, who discovered the dwarf planet Haumea in 2005.

According to existing data, chemical composition the surfaces of Pluto, Eris and Makemake are similar. They consist mainly of nitrogen and frozen methane. Planetologists explain the sharp difference in the brightness of Pluto and Eris by the fact that Pluto has an atmosphere, while Eris, located far from the Sun, does not. The atmosphere apparently condenses on the surface there and forms snow-white ice. Pluto passed its closest orbit to the Sun in 1989 and is currently surrounded by a thin atmosphere of nitrogen. Therefore, there is probably no pure ice on its surface.

Dwarf planet, plutoid, classic Kuiper belt object. Initially designated as 2005 FY9, later received the number 136472. According to astronomers at the Palomar Observatory (California), it has a diameter of 50% to 75% of the diameter of Pluto and ranks third (or fourth) in diameter among Kuiper Belt objects. Unlike other large trans-Neptunian objects, Makemake has not yet discovered any satellites, and therefore its mass and density remain uncertain.

Makemake is a dwarf planet

The facility was opened on March 31, 2005 by a team led by Michael E. Brown. The discovery was announced on July 29, 2005 - on the same day as two other large trans-Neptunian objects: Eris. Clyde Tombaugh had the opportunity to observe Makemake in 1930, since the object at that time was only a few degrees from the ecliptic, on the border of the constellations Taurus and Auriga, and its visible magnitude was 16m. However, this is too close to Milky Way, which made it very difficult to observe him. Tombaugh continued searching for other trans-Neptunian objects for several years after the discovery of Pluto, but failed.

In July 2008, the International Astronomical Union, at the suggestion of Michael Brown, named the object Makemake, in honor of the deity of Rapa Nui mythology. Brown explained his choice of name by the fact that the facility was opened on the eve of Easter (the Rapanui people are the aborigines of Easter Island).

In 2009, Makemake was 52 a.m. away. that is, from the Sun, that is, almost at the aphelion. Makemake's orbit, like Haumea's, is inclined 29° and has an eccentricity of about 0.16. But, at the same time, its orbit is located slightly further than the orbit of Haumea, both along the semimajor axis and at perihelion. The object's orbital period around the Sun is 310 years, versus 248 for Pluto and 283 for Haumea. Makemake will reach its aphelion in 2033.

Unlike plutinos, classical Kuiper belt objects, to which and belongs, do not have an orbital resonance with Neptune (2:3) and do not depend on its perturbations. Like other Kuiper belt objects, Makemake has a slight eccentricity.

By decision of the International Astronomical Union in 2006, Makemake was included in the group of dwarf planets. On June 11, 2008, the IAU announced the identification of a subclass of plutoids in the class of dwarf planets. Makemake was included in it, along with Pluto and Eris.

Dwarf planet Makemake: interesting facts

The object is currently the second brightest after Pluto, with an apparent magnitude of 16.7m. This is enough to be visible at large amateur telescope. Based on Makemake's albedo, we can conclude that the surface temperature is approximately 30 °K. The size of the dwarf planet is not known exactly, but according to studies carried out in the infrared range by the Spitzer telescope, and in comparison with the spectrum of Pluto, it is generally accepted that its diameter is about 1500 + 400 x 200 km. This is slightly larger than the diameter of Haumea, possibly making Makemake the third-largest trans-Neptunian object after Eris and Pluto. The absolute magnitude of this dwarf planet is ?0.48m, which guarantees that its size is sufficient to be a spheroid. Weight~4?1021 kg.

In a letter to the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, Licandro and others reported on research conducted in the visible and long-infrared regions of Makemake. They used the William Herschel Telescope and Telescopio Nazionale Galileo and found that Makemake's surface was similar to that of Pluto. Methane absorption bands were also detected. Methane has also been found on Pluto and Eris, but in much smaller quantities.

Research has shown that the surface of Makemake may be covered with methane grains at least 1 cm in diameter. It is also possible that there is, and in large quantities, ethane and tholin, arising from methane as a result of photolysis by exposure solar radiation. The presence of frozen nitrogen is also assumed, although not in such quantities as on Pluto or, especially, on Triton.

It is assumed that the main component of Makemake's rarefied atmosphere may be nitrogen.

In 2007, a group of Spanish astronomers led by J. Ortiz determined by changing the brightness of Makemake its rotation period was 22.48 hours. In 2009, new measurements of brightness fluctuations carried out by American astronomers gave a new value for the period - 7.77 hours (about three times less). The authors of the study suggested that we now see Makemake almost from the pole, and for precise definition the period must wait several decades.


has no satellites. Moons, if they exist, would be detected even if the brightness was 1% of the dwarf planet's brightness and Makemake's distance was 0.4 arcseconds or greater.

Astronomers have discovered a satellite near one of the largest and second brightest (after Pluto) icy dwarf planets, Makemake. This was reported on the NASA website.

The celestial body with the code S/2015 (136472) and the name MK 2 is 1.3 thousand times fainter than Makemake. The satellite orbits the dwarf planet at a distance of about 21 thousand kilometers and reaches a diameter of 160 kilometers. If MK 2 moves in a circular orbit around Makemake, its orbital period is at least 12 days.

The shape of the orbit is important in figuring out the origin of the satellite. In case it is circular, this could indicate the origin of MK 2 as a result of Makemake colliding with another celestial body from the Kuiper belt (located at a distance of 30 to 55 astronomical units from the sun). If MK 2's trajectory around the dwarf planet is elongated, the satellite could have been captured by a celestial body from the Kuiper Belt several billion years ago.

Photo: A. Parker and M. Buie (SwRI) / NASA / ESA

The discovery of MK 2 could also explain the infrared anomalies observed in the study of Makemake: although the dwarf planet's surface is bright and cool, its temperature in some areas is higher than in surrounding areas. The reason for this may be the dark surface of the celestial body.

Low brightness and grey colour MK 2 (vs. dwarf planet) scientists explain it by its low mass: ice, as a result of sublimation under the influence of solar radiation, turns into gaseous state and thus does not linger on the surface of the satellite. This makes it look like a comet.

Video: NASA Goddard/YouTube

Astronomers discovered MK 2 using the Wide Field Camera 3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. The discovery of Makemake's satellite used the same technique used in 2005, 2011 and 2012 to study Pluto's small moons. The observations were carried out in April 2015 and only now have they been able to complete their analysis. In the NASA image, MK 2 is visible as a small, bright body near Makemake. In the future, astronomers plan to clarify the orbital parameters, size and mass of the moon.

Makemake - cosmic body with a rocky surface and the third largest dwarf planet in our solar system is located in a distant region of space - the Kuiper belt beyond the orbit of Pluto.

After the discovery of the planet in 2005, astronomers for a long time could not determine the size of Makemake, but some scientists suggested that it was smaller than Pluto.

During observations of Makemake in 2010 using the Spitzer Space Telescope, researchers calculated the diameter of the planet to be 1400-1600 km. This size is enough for Makemake to overtake another dwarf planet, Haumea, to become the third largest among similar planets. In addition, it turned out that Makemake is a slightly flattened ball that makes full turn around the Sun in 310 Earth years.

Studying the dwarf planet, astronomers came to the conclusion that the surface of Makemake contains methane and ethane in a frozen state in the form of grains, as well as nitrogen. Methane grains are about 1 cm in size, and ethane grains are about 0.1 mm in size. There is very little nitrogen on Makemak; a small amount of it is contained in methane ice. It is believed that nitrogen reserves have been exhausted throughout the entire existence of the planet. In all likelihood, a significant part of it was carried away by the planetary wind.

Astronomers also believe that there are tholins on the planet's surface that have a red tint, making Makemake appear slightly reddish. Tolin is organic matter. They are a mixture of different organic copolymers (substances whose molecular chains consist of two or more structural units). Shades characteristic of tholins are reddish-brown or reddish-orange. Tholins are formed whenever ultraviolet light from the sun interacts with ethane and methane.

An interesting phenomenon occurs with the atmosphere of Makemake. When the planet, moving in its orbit, approaches the Sun, granular methane and ethane heat up and, under the influence of heat, transform into their usual gaseous state. These gases then rise up and surround the planet atmospheric layer. The methane-ethane atmosphere exists as long as Makemake is in such a favorable “heat zone”. As the planet begins to move away from the Sun, moving into colder space terrain, methane and ethane freeze. They fall like snow flakes onto the surface and there take the form of grains.

Discovery of the planet

The first people to discover this planet were astronomers Michael Brown, David Rabinowitz and Chadwick Trujillo. They discovered Makemake on March 31, 2005, a few days after Easter, which fell on March 27 that year. Since the object was opened almost immediately after the holiday, scientists wanted to call new planet a name somehow related to the word “Easter”. It was decided to give the planet the name of the mythological god of the Rapanui people - the inhabitants of Easter Island, Make-make - the god of abundance and the creator of humanity.

Interesting Facts

There are some areas on the planet that appear as dark lines and are inaccessible for observation. This happens because the neighbor infrared spectrum Makemake is marked by strong methane absorption lines. At the frequencies of these lines, atoms absorb quanta electromagnetic radiation, after which the quanta are re-emitted in an arbitrary direction, and the mass of matter that makes up the surface of the planet begins to scatter the radiation in different directions.

In March 2016, a satellite was discovered in orbit of the planet, which was named MK 2. The diameter of the moon Makemake is 160 kilometers, and the body orbits the planet in 12 Earth days. Interestingly, MK 2 is a very dark object, while Makemake has a fairly bright surface due to the icy methane.

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Makemake- dwarf planet, plutoid, classic Kuiper belt object. Initially designated as 2005 FY9, later received the number 136472. According to astronomers at the Palomar Observatory (California), it has a diameter of 50% to 75% of the diameter of Pluto and ranks third (or fourth) in diameter among Kuiper Belt objects. Unlike other large trans-Neptunian objects, Makemake has not yet discovered any satellites, and therefore its mass and density remain uncertain.

The facility was opened on March 31, 2005 by a team led by Michael E. Brown. The discovery was announced on July 29, 2005 - the same day as two other large trans-Neptunian objects: Haumea and Eris. Clyde Tombaugh had the opportunity to observe Makemake in 1930, since the object at that time was only a few degrees from the ecliptic, on the border of the constellations Taurus and Auriga, and its apparent magnitude was 16m. However, it is too close to the Milky Way, making it very difficult to observe. Tombaugh continued searching for other trans-Neptunian objects for several years after the discovery of Pluto, but failed.

In July 2008, the International Astronomical Union, at the suggestion of Michael Brown, named the object Makemake, in honor of the deity of Rapa Nui mythology. Brown explained his choice of name by the fact that the facility was opened on the eve of Easter (the Rapanui people are the aborigines of Easter Island).

In 2009, Makemake was 52 a.m. away. that is, from the Sun, that is, almost at the aphelion. Makemake's orbit, like Haumea's, is inclined 29° and has an eccentricity of about 0.16. But, at the same time, its orbit is located slightly further than the orbit of Haumea, both along the semimajor axis and at perihelion. The object's orbital period around the Sun is 310 years, versus 248 for Pluto and 283 for Haumea. Makemake will reach its aphelion in 2033.

Unlike plutinos, classical Kuiper belt objects, to which Makemake, do not have an orbital resonance with Neptune (2:3) and do not depend on its disturbances. Like other Kuiper belt objects, Makemake has a slight eccentricity.

By decision of the International Astronomical Union in 2006, Makemake was included in the group of dwarf planets. On June 11, 2008, the IAU announced the identification of a subclass of plutoids in the class of dwarf planets. Makemake was included in it, along with Pluto and Eris.

Dwarf planet Makemake: interesting facts

The object is currently the second brightest after Pluto, with an apparent magnitude of 16.7m. This is enough to be visible in a large amateur telescope. Based on Makemake's albedo, we can conclude that the surface temperature is approximately 30 °K. The size of the dwarf planet is not known exactly, but according to studies carried out in the infrared range by the Spitzer telescope, and in comparison with the spectrum of Pluto, it is generally accepted that its diameter is about 1500 + 400 x 200 km. This is slightly larger than the diameter of Haumea, possibly making Makemake the third-largest trans-Neptunian object after Eris and Pluto. The absolute magnitude of this dwarf planet is ?0.48m, which guarantees that its size is sufficient to be a spheroid. Weight~4?1021 kg.

In a letter to the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, Licandro and others reported on research conducted in the visible and long-infrared regions of Makemake. They used the William Herschel Telescope and Telescopio Nazionale Galileo and found that Makemake's surface was similar to that of Pluto. Methane absorption bands were also detected. Methane has also been found on Pluto and Eris, but in much smaller quantities.

Research has shown that the surface of Makemake may be covered with methane grains at least 1 cm in diameter. It is also possible that ethane and tholin are present in large quantities, arising from methane as a result of photolysis under the influence of solar radiation. The presence of frozen nitrogen is also assumed, although not in such quantities as on Pluto or, especially, on Triton.

It is assumed that the main component of Makemake's rarefied atmosphere may be nitrogen.

In 2007, a group of Spanish astronomers led by J. Ortiz determined by changing the brightness of Makemake its rotation period was 22.48 hours. In 2009, new measurements of brightness fluctuations carried out by American astronomers gave a new value for the period - 7.77 hours (about three times less). The authors of the study suggested that we now see Makemake almost from the pole, and to accurately determine the period we must wait several decades.


Dwarf planet Makemake has no satellites. Moons, if they exist, would be detected even if the brightness was 1% of the dwarf planet's brightness and Makemake's distance was 0.4 arcseconds or greater.