Is Zoozve a half-moon in the Solar System? Discover history

Lately Radiolab podcast host Latif Nasser Asked about a moon-like thing called ‘Zoozve’when he noticed his son’s astronomy poster mentioned him. It has been described as the pseudo-moon of Venus. Unfortunately Nasser couldn’t find any information on Google and NASA didn’t mention it in any articles or publications.

After calling Liz Landau, the poster’s illustrator and senior communications specialist at the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the podcast host realized it was a labeling error made by the image’s artist. In reality, the quasi-satellite was named 2002-VE68 and is actually a near-Venus object.

Venus had a moon called Zoozve. Huh, I thought. I’ve never heard of this. pic.twitter.com/3reaeMB5WQ

— Latif Nasser (@latifnasser) January 26, 2024

What is moon-like?

Experts in the field explain that a quasi-moon is an object captured by a planet’s gravity that orbits in a shape similar to a moon like the one on Earth, but is not actually the same type of cosmic structure. Well, Although it has similar characteristics to the Moon, it cannot be placed in the same category as natural satellites, as accepted by science.

“When he called NASA to ask about it, they had never heard of Zoozve and insisted that it was not a moon of Venus. So begins a little mystery that leads to a newly discovered type of object in our solar system that is both lunar and non-lunar at the same time, and it paves the way to ask one of the most profound questions about our universe: How could it be predicted? , Really? “So what does this mean for our place here?” is explained by Radiolab as follows.

Is Zoozve half-moon real?

As previously mentioned, the poster’s illustrator made a mistake in identifying the cosmic object as ‘Zoozve’, originally named 2002 VE 68. HE The artist mixed the numbers 2002 with the letters spelling ‘Zooz’ and created the name ‘Zoozve’ by adding the letter ‘AND’ from the original letters.

The first numerical part of the lunar analog refers to 2002, the year it was discovered, while the words ‘AND’ have been added based on a specific NASA designation.

It has a satellite-like orbit around the Sun and completes a ‘year’ in just under 225 days; This is approximately the same time it takes Venus to complete one ‘year’.. In fact, the planet and 2002 VE 68 orbit the Sun almost synchronously..

An article on the subject explains: 2002 VE has been on the same orbital path for nearly seven thousand years and will probably remain on the same path for another five centuries. Scientists explain that this is likely an asteroid that was close to Earth seven thousand years ago and was deviated into its current orbit due to the gravitational effect of our planet.

“We find that 2002 VE68 will remain a quasi-satellite of Venus for about 500 more years and that its dynamical evolution is controlled not only by Earth, with a non-negligible contribution from the Moon, but also by Mercury. 2002 VE68 exhibits resonance behavior (or Mercury, “Our calculations show that an actual collision with Earth is unlikely within the next 10,000 years, but encounters as close as 0.04 au occur periodically every 8 years.” of the object.

Did you like the content? Continue to explore more astronomical curiosities with this book from TecMundo. If you want, take the opportunity to find out whether Earth can exit our solar system.