Iocaste, also known as , is a retrograde irregular satellite of Jupiter.
It was discovered by a team of astronomers from the University of Hawaii led by Scott S. Sheppard in 2000, and given the temporary designation .
Iocaste orbits Jupiter at an average distance of 20.723 million kilometers in 640.97 days, at an inclination of 147° to the ecliptic (146° to Jupiter's equator) with an eccentricity of 0.2874.
It was named in October 2002 after Jocasta, the mother/wife of Oedipus in Greek mythology.
Iocaste belongs to the Ananke group, believed to be the remnants of a break-up of a captured heliocentric asteroid.Sheppard, S. S.; Jewitt, D. C.; "An Abundant Population of Small Irregular Satellites Around Jupiter" , Nature, Vol. 423 (May 2003), pp.
261–263Nesvorný, D.; Alvarellos, J. L. A.; Dones, L.; and Levison, H. F.; "Orbital and Collisional Evolution of the Irregular Satellites", The Astronomical Journal, Vol. 126 (2003), pp.
398–429
The satellite is about 5 kilometres in diameterSheppard, S. S.; Jewitt, D. C.; Porco, C. C.; "Jupiter's Outer Satellites and Trojans" , in Jupiter: The Planet, Satellites and Magnetosphere, edited by Fran Bagenal, Timothy E. Dowling, and William B. McKinnon, Cambridge Planetary Science, Vol. 1, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, , 2004, pp.
263–280 and appears grey (colour indices B−V=0.63, R−V=0.36), similar to C-type asteroids.Grav, T.; Holman, M. J.; Gladman, B. J.; and Aksnes, K.; "Photometric survey of the irregular satellites", Icarus, Vol. 166 (2003), pp.
33–45 See also
Moons of Jupiter
Praxidike
References
Further reading
Ephemeris IAU-MPC NSES
Mean orbital parameters NASA JPL
