Neptune is the eight and farthest planet from the Sun. It is considered to be fourth largest planet by diameter and the third largest when it comes to mass. Neptune was identified after the Roman god of the sea, who is the counterpart of Poseidon and has the astronomical sign of the god’s trident.

Neptune was said to be first observed by Galileo because of his drawings that indicated it as a star or something that is related to Jupiter. Therefore, he was not officially recognized as the discoverer of Neptune. It was agreed upon that it was discovered on September 23 of 1846 through mathematical prediction and remains to be the only planet that has been found without using regular observation. Neptune has 13 known moons but shortly after the planet’s discovery, Triton, the largest, was located. It is the only moon with a retrograde orbit, which means that it is orbiting contrary to the planet’s rotation. However, none of the twelve remaining moons were discovered until the 20th Century. During August 25, 1989 the Voyager 2 was the only spacecraft that ever visited Neptune. It made many discoveries there. The six of Neptune’s moons were spotted and were named later on. There have been a lot of studies that were conducted to further understand the moons of Neptune, especially the Triton, which is believed to be holding evidence that once life existed there.

Like Uranus, Neptune is blue-green in color because its atmosphere also contains methane in the outermost areas. Both were categorized as the “ice giants.” Similar to Jupiter, Neptune has dark-colored storm-like features. As found by the Voyager 2, this planet has the strongest winds, which could be as high as 2100 kilometers per hour. It has also one of the coldest temperatures in the solar system mainly because of its great distance from the Sun. Named first as the “planet exterior to Uranus,” Voyager 2 found the Great Dark Spot, which is also similar to the Great Red Spot of the planet Jupiter.

Neptune can never be spotted with the naked eye. It is easily outshone by the brightness of Jupiter’s moons, the dwarf planet and the asteroids. Pluto crosses the orbit of Neptune, traveling inside the orbit for about twenty years out of every 248 years. A day on Neptune is shorter than an Earth-day. However, it takes 165 Earth-years to complete one year on Neptune. During the exploration of the spacecraft, Voyager 2, the signal that came from the planet came to Earth after 246 minutes of waiting. There is a magnetic field surrounding the planet in the same tilted manner like Uranus’ field. Voyager 2 also discovered that Neptune has six dark rings, which are thick in some places. Some rings appear to be broken because in some parts, the thin places are no longer visible from Earth.

Neptune’s mass is seventeen times the mass of the Earth but the gravity is lower because of its size. If you are a 100-pound person, you would weigh 119 pounds on Neptune.

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