From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aitne
or
Jupiter XXXI
, is a non-
spherical
moon of
Jupiter
. It was found by a team of astronomers from the
University of Hawaii
led by
Scott S. Sheppard
,
et al.
in
2001
, and given the designation
S/2001 J 11
.
[1]
[2]
Aitne is about 3 kilometres in diameter, and orbits Jupiter at an average distance of 22,285,000 km in 679.641 days, at an
inclination
of 166° to the
ecliptic
(164° to Jupiter's equator), with an
orbital eccentricity
of 0.393.
It was named in August 2003
[3]
after Aitna or Aitne, the divine personification of
Mount Etna
, whose sons by
Zeus
(Jupiter) are the
Palici
, the twin sicilian gods of
geysers
(other authors have them descend from
Thalia
and/or
Hephaistos
).
Aitne belongs to the
Carme group
, made up of non-spherical irregular
retrograde
moons orbiting Jupiter at a distance ranging between 23,000,000 and 24,000,000 km and at an inclination of about 165°.