Teardrops from the Moon Trivia Quiz

Answer: No

There is no water on the Moon! The seas are actually basalt plains formed by volcanic eruptions, but early astronomers mistook them for seas. They tend to be named for geographical features such as clouds, states of mind, or sea attributes, a concept introduced by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Riccioli. There are also smaller plains known as 'lakes'.

Answer: Asaph Hall

Although there had been speculation since the discovery of Jupiter's moons that Mars also had moons, thanks to Kepler's misinterpretation of a comment by Galileo (actually about Saturn's rings), it was not until August 1877 that the American astronomer Asaph Hall discovered Phobos and Deimos.

He first noticed an object by the side of the planet, and realised that it was moving along with Mars. This object turned out to be Deimos, and Phobos was discovered soon after. There's even a crater on Phobos (the larger of the two moons), the Hall crater, named after him, as well as the asteroid 3299 Hall.

Answer: Luna 9

Luna 9 was part of the Soviet Union's Luna programme. It was launched on 31st January 1966, and landed on the Moon three days later. It captured eight hours' worth of radio footage, as well as photographs which created a panoramic view of the Moon's surface when put together. Scientists at Jodrell Bank in England were able to decode the photographs from Luna 9, and they were published worldwide.

The fact that the craft achieved a soft landing showed that a craft could land on the Moon without sinking.

Answer: Olivine

Olivine got its name from its green colour, and is not only found on Earth, Mars and the Moon, but on meteorites and the asteroid 25143 Itokawa as well. Rocks containing large amounts of olivine have been discovered near impact craters on the Moon, and are thought to have originated from the lunar mantle, beneath the Moon's surface.

The discovery was made by the Japanese Kaguya probe in 2007.

Answer: Venus doesn't have any moons

Venus and Mercury are the only two planets in our solar system without moons. As for the other answers, Ganymede is one of Jupiter's moons. Phoebe is one of Saturn's irregular satellites, part of the Norse Group (although it is the only one not named after a character from Norse mythology). Artemis is Sailor Venus's cat in the anime 'Sailor Moon'.

Answer: Hydra

Along with Nix, Hydra was discovered in 2005 by the Hubble Space Telescope's Pluto Companion Search Team. In 2015, it was photographed by the New Horizons probe, a probe sent into space with the intention of studying Pluto, and then venturing into the Kuiper Belt, where Pluto and various other minor satellites are based.

It is thought to have an icy surface. Like Hydra, the other moons of Pluto all take their names from monsters and the underworld (Charon is the ferryman who takes the souls of the dead to the underworld, Styx is a river in the underworld, Nix is the goddess of night and Charon's mother, and Kerberos is a monstrous dog that guards the underworld).

Answer: It takes 26 years to orbit Neptune

Neso is the moon with the 26-year orbit; Triton's is a mere 6 days (approximately) in comparison, though it orbits Neptune in the opposite direction to which the planet is moving. It is one of the few geologically active moons in the solar system, with ice volcanoes and geysers of nitrogen gas.

The 'cantaloupe terrain' is on the western hemisphere of the moon, and is so called because its surface of fissures and depressions make it look like the skin of a cantaloupe melon. It is mainly composed of dirty water ice.

Answer: It has a dense atmosphere

Of all known moons, Titan is the only one to have a dense atmosphere. Like Earth, the atmosphere of Titan is rich in nitrogen, although in this case, it's 97% nitrogen, the rest being methane, hydrogen and traces of other gases. According to observations made by the Cassini probe in 2004, it rotates faster than the moon itself!

Answer: Characters from English literature

Miranda, Oberon and Titania are named after characters from Shakespeare's plays ('The Tempest' and 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'), while Ariel and Umbriel are named after characters from 'The Rape of the Lock' by Alexander Pope, although there is an Ariel in 'The Tempest' as well.

Other, smaller moons include Trinculo, Mab, Sycorax and Perdita. Oberon and Titania, the largest moon, were discovered by William Herschel in 1787; Ariel and Umbriel by William Lassell in 1851; and Miranda in 1948 by Gerald Kuiper.

Answer: Galilean moons

The four biggest moons of Jupiter - Ganymede, Io, Europa and Callisto - are known as the Galilean moons because they were discovered by Galileo Galilei in 1610. They were the first satellites of another planet to be discovered, and are named after lovers of Zeus, the Greek counterpart of the god Jupiter. Ganymede is the biggest moon in the entire solar system, and has a magnetic field - as discovered by the Galileo probe - and a metallic core.