Contact
The WGSBN can be contacted at
contact@wgsbn-iau.org.
Problems with the website should be reported to secretary@wgsbn-iau.org.
Rotating Members Interest Form
The form for IAU members to register interest in becoming Rotating Members of the WGSBN in future years is
now available.
Name Proposal Link
Discoverers can use this link to access the name proposal
site. Registration is required to access the site. Discoverers who require
access should request access.
Support This Site
Information on how you can support the operation of this website.
Naming Guidelines
Comet Naming Guidelines
Minor Planet Naming Guidelines
(Translations)
Members
There are 15 members of the WGSBN, 11 of whom are voting members. The other four members, who are ex-officio, are representatives for the IAU WG Planetary System Nomenclature and the Minor Planet Center, as well
as the IAU President and General Secretary.
The current members of the WGSBN are listed below:
- Jana Tichá, Chair
- Keith Noll, Vice-Chair
- Gareth Williams, Secretary
- Yuliya Chernetenko
- Julio Fernández
- Daniel Green
- Pam Kilmartin
- Syuichi Nakano
- Ryan S. Park (Rotating Member)
- Driss Takir (Rotating Member)
- Jin Zhu
- Debra M. Elmegreen, ex-officio (IAU President)
- Piero Benvenuti, ex-officio (interim IAU General Secretary)
- Rita Schulz, ex-officio (WGPSN)
- Peter Vereš, ex-officio (MPC)
Statistics
There are currently 24836
named minor planets.
The WGSBN is a Working Group (WG) of the
International Astronomical Union (IAU)
and is responsible for assigning names to minor planets and comets. It
is a functional WG, which means that it exists beyond the regular
three-year lifespan of IAU WGs.
News
The six most recent news items are listed below. The complete archive of news items is
here.
July 19: Information on the Checking Discovery Circumstances Process
Some
information is now available on the process of checking the discovery circumstances for the numbered minor planet subject to the "new" rules for discovery credit.
July 15: WGSBN Bulletin 4, #10 Issued
WGSBN Bulletin 4, #10 has been
issued, containing 14 new names of minor planets.
July 1: WGSBN Bulletin 4, #9 Issued
WGSBN Bulletin 4, #9 has been
issued, containing 27 new names of minor planets.
June 10: WGSBN Bulletin 4, #8 Issued
WGSBN Bulletin 4, #8 has been
issued, containing 10 new names of minor planets.
May 27: First Draft of Document Describing How To Use the New Submission Site
The first draft of a document describing the use of the new WGSBN name-proposal submission site is
now available. Please send any corrections or requests for clarifications to secretary@wgsbn-iau.org. A second draft (V1.1) is now available.
May 26: The New Submission/Voting Site Is Active
The
new submission/voting site is now active! Beta-testers should find that they can now login (email secretary@wgsbn-iau.org if this is not the case). Other discoverers who had accounts on the old site should request their new initial password by emailing secretary@wgsbn-iau.org (your username is unchanged), mentioning your username in the old system. If you are requesting an account for the first time, please state this and mention which observatory code or discoverer name you wish to associate with your account.
Sign Up For New Bulletin Alerts
Enter an e-mail address to receive notifications of the availability of new
issues of the WGSBN Bulletin.
You will receive a message at the offered e-mail address containing a link
that you must click in order to activate or cancel your subscription.
WGSBN Bulletins
Current and past issues of the
WGSBN Bulletin are available below,
as well as
on the IAU website (note that the dates displayed on the IAU page are the dates they were posted there, not [necessarily] when they were published).
The latest issue is here and links
to older issues are here.
For convenience, links to the issues from the most recent volume are listed below:
2024
- Volume 4, #10 (2024 Jul 14)
- Volume 4, #9 (2024 Jul 1)
- Volume 4, #8 (2024 Jun 10)
- Volume 4, #7 (2024 May 20)
- Volume 4, #6 (2024 Apr 29)
- Volume 4, #5 (2024 Apr 9)
- Volume 4, #4 (2024 Mar 18)
- Volume 4, #3 (2024 Feb 26)
- Volume 4, #2 (2024 Feb 5)
- Volume 4, #1 (2024 Jan 15)
Data Files
Links to JSON files associated with each
WGSBN Bulletin are available below.
The latest set of files are here (UTF-8 only) or here (UTF-8 + HTML), and links
to older files are here.
For convenience, links to the files from the most recent volume are listed below:
2024
- Volume 4, #10 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Jul 15)
- Volume 4, #9 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Jul 1)
- Volume 4, #8 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Jun 13)
- Volume 4, #7 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 May 20)
- Volume 4, #6 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Apr 29)
- Volume 4, #5 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Apr 9)
- Volume 4, #4 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Mar 18)
- Volume 4, #3 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Feb 26)
- Volume 4, #2 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Feb 5)
- Volume 4, #1 UTF-8 only UTF-8 + HTML (2024 Jan 15)
Corrigenda Files
Links to JSON files associated with corrigenda for the errata listed in the
WGSBN Bulletin are available below.
The latest file is here and links
to older files are here.
For convenience, links to the most recent corrigenda files are listed below:
Documentation
Information on the format and information content of the data files on the WG's website
is available.
This page also contains links to various WG documents involving nomenclature issues.
Problem E-Mail Addresses
Information on problem e-mails in the list of addresses used for notification of new issues
is available.
Printed WGSBN Bulletin Yearbooks
Printed yearbooks of the
WGSBN Bulletin are published by
WGSBN Publishing, a specialist scientific publisher.