Discovery of Thyone

Thyone is one of the small, irregular outer moons of Jupiter and a member of the Ananke group, whose orbits are similar enough to suggest a common origin in a captured body that was later shattered. Only a few kilometres across, it circles the planet at a large distance in a retrograde direction, opposite to the way Jupiter spins. The moon was discovered during a survey of the outer moons of Jupiter carried out by astronomers at the University of Hawaii. Its name refers to Thyone, a title given in Greek mythology to Semele, the mother of Dionysus by Zeus.

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