HONOLULU, May 4 (UPI) -- U.S. astronomers said they have discovered 12 new moons orbiting Saturn, BBC News Online reported Wednesday.
If confirmed, the new moons would bring Saturn's count to 46. Jupiter, with 63, still has the most moons. Uranus has 27 and Neptune 13.
Astronomers at the University of Hawaii said all the newly discovered moons are small, irregular bodies -- probably only about 1 mile to 4 miles in diameter. They are distant from Saturn and each takes about two years to complete one orbit.
All but one of the planetoids circles the ringed planet in the opposite direction to its larger moons. This is a characteristic of captured bodies, the astronomers said. The moons probably originated in the asteroid belt, which forms a loose ring around the sun between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. They probably were scattered farther out into the solar system by Jupiter's gravity, they said, where they were captured by the four large outer planets -- including Jupiter.
