Neptune

What is Planet Neptune?

The ice giant Neptune was the first planet located through mathematical predictions rather than through regular observations of the sky. (Galileo had recorded it as a fixed star during observations with his small telescope in 1612 and 1613.) When Uranus didn't travel exactly as astronomers expected it to, a French mathematician, Urbain Joseph Le Verrier, proposed the position and mass of another as yet unknown planet that could cause the observed changes to Uranus' orbit. After being ignored by French astronomers, Le Verrier sent his predictions to Johann Gottfried Galle at the Berlin Observatory, who found Neptune on his first night of searching in 1846. Seventeen days later, its largest moon, Triton, was also discovered. Nearly 4.5 billion kilometers (2.8 billion miles) from the Sun, Neptune orbits the Sun once every 165 years

Why Planet Neptune is named Neptune?

Neptune was predicted by John Couch Adams and Urbain Le Verrier. The men independently accounted for the irregularities in the motion of Uranus by correctly predicting the orbital elements of a trans-Uranian planet. Using the predicted parameters of Le Verrier (Adams never published his predictions), Johann Galle discovered the planet in 1846. Galle wanted to name the planet for Le Verrier, but that was not acceptable to the international astronomical community. Instead, this planet is named for the Roman god of the sea.