Minor Feature

Minor feature

(glossary entry)

Description

An informal name for a special category of very small features that have been given official names in the IAU Nomenclature.
 Note:
  Some of them are not that small. Nearside crater Natasha' is the largest one (12 km), it is depicted on classic moonmaps such as Hallwags. The somewhat elongated depression Kathleen (at Palus Putredinis) is also an easy target for common telescopes, so is bowl-shaped crater Jehan (diameter 5 kilometer) near Natasha.
 
 

Alphabetic list of Minor Feature Names of the Apollo era (orbital lunar photography)

Agnes (mons), Akis, Alan, Aloha, Andre (mons), Ango, Ann, Annegrit, Ardeshir (mons), Artemis, Bawa, Bela, Boris (rupes), Brigitte (catena), Carlos, Carmen (rima), Carol, Chang-Ngo, Charles, Ching-Te, Christel (vallis), Cleopatra (rima), Courtney, Dag, Delia, Diana, Dieter (mons), Dilip (mons), Donna, Edith, Esam (mons), Ewen, Fairouz, Felix, Ganau (mons), Gaston, Grace, Harold, Ian, Ina, Isabel, Isis, Ivan, Jehan, Jerik, Jomo, Jose, Julienne, Karima, Kasper, Kathleen, Kira, Krishna (vallis), Linda, Louise, Manuel, Marcello (rima), Mary, Mavis, Melissa, Michael, Monira, Natasha, Osama, Osiris, Osman, Patricia, Pierre (catena), Priscilla, Ravi, Reiko (rima), Robert, Rocco, Romeo, Rosa, Rudolf (fossa/ rima), Ruth, Samir, Shahinaz, Siegfried (rima), Sita, Soraya, Stella, Sung-Mei (rima), Susan, Taizo, Thera (dorsum), Vera, Verne, Vladimir (rima), Walter, Wan-Yu (rima), Yoshi, Yuri (catena), Zahia (rima).
 
 Of these, most of them are female names:
 Agnes, Greek female name
 Akis, Greek female name
 Aloha, Hawaiian female name
 Ann, Hebrew female name
 Annegrit, German female name
 Artemis, name of Greek moon goddess
 Béla, Slavic female name
 Brigitte, French female name
 Carmen, Spanish female name
 Carol, Latin female name
 Chang-Ngo, Chinese female name
 Christel, German female name
 Cleopatra, Greek female name
 Delia, Greek female name (member of Catena Davy)
 Diana, Latin female name
 Donna, Italian female name
 Edith, English female name
 Fairouz, Arab female name
 Grace, English female name
 Ina, Latin female name
 Isabel, Spanish female name
 Isis, name of Egyptian goddess
 Jehan, Turkish female name (aka Euler K, easy to observe through common telescopes because it is a bowl-shaped crater, diameter 5 kilometer)
 Julienne, French female name
 Karima, Arabic female name
 Kathleen, Irish female name (easy to observe through common telescopes!) (name not mentioned on Chart 22 of Rukl's moonatlas, strange)
 Kira, Russian female name
 Linda, Spanish female name
 Louise, French female name
 Mary, English form of Hebrew female name
 Mavis, Scottish female name
 Melissa, Greek female name
 Monira, Arabic female name
 Natasha, Russian female name (aka Euler P, Copeland's Tennis Racquet) (with its diameter of 12 kilometer this is the largest one of the Minor Features, very easy to observe through common telescopes!)
 Patricia, English female name
 Priscilla, Latin female name (member of Catena Davy)
 Reiko, Japanese female name
 Rosa, Spanish female name
 Ruth, Hebrew female name (very easy to observe because Ruth's location is very near crater Krieger and the small bowl-shaped crater Rocco)
 Shahinaz, Turkish female name
 Sita, Indian female name
 Soraya, Persian female name
 Stella, Latin female name
 Sung-Mei, Chinese female name
 Susan, English female name (member of Catena Davy)
 Thera, Greek female name
 Vera, Latin female name
 Wan-Yu, Chinese female name
 Zahia, Arabic female name
 
 

Additional Information

During the preparation for NASA of the highly-detailed Apollo-imagery related maps known as the Topophotomap series, names were assigned to a number of extremely small features. The legends at the bottom of the maps say they were intended as “informal” names to be used only in describing that particular map. However, in 1976 most, but not all of these, were formally adopted into the official IAU Nomenclature. The IAU does not recognize these as a separate category of feature, and hence they are lumped together with much more significant features of the same type. This leads many newcomers to lunar nomenclature to wonder why these particular tiny features have names, while innumerable other larger features do not. The reason is that they happened to fall in one of the very few portions of the Moon covered by a Topophotomap.
 
  A list of 95 features of this type can be found on page 175 of NASA RP-1097. One of these is a ‘Dorsa’, 3 are ‘Catena’, 7 are ‘Mons’, 10 are ‘Rima’, and the remainder are listed as ‘Craters’. This is not necessarily a complete list of Minor Features in the IAU Nomenclature, and some of the names in this list may have subsequently changed. For example, “Christel’ and ‘Krishna’ are now ‘Vallis Christel’ and ‘Vallis Krishna’.
 
 

Nomenclature of tiny craterlets near the landing sites of the Apollo project's 6 Lunar Modules (Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17)

To these might be added the Apollo Landing Site Names which added an additional 79 very minor features to the IAU nomenclature. The Landing Site Names are a special category recognized by the IAU. The more numerous and more widely-scattered minor features described here are not.
 - Jim Mosher
 
 

Luna 17 - Lunokhod 1

12 officially recognized names for craterlets near the landing site of Luna 17, south of Promontorium Heraclides (Luna 17 with its Lunokhod 1 rover):
  Albert, Borya, Gena, Igor, Kostya, Leonid, Kolya, Nikolya, Slava, Valera, Vasya, Vitya.
 
 

Luna 24

1 officially recognized name for the craterlet near the landingsite of Luna 24, at the southern part of Mare Crisium:
 Lev
 
 

Chang'e-3

3 officially recognized names for craterlets near the landing site of Chang'e-3, at Mare Imbrium:
 Tai Wei, Tian Shi, Zi Wei
 
 

LPOD Articles

Bibliography

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