This is a list of astronomical objects named after people. While topological features on
Solar System bodies — such as craters, mountains, and valleys — are often named after famous or historical individuals, many stars and
deep-sky objects are named after the individual(s) who discovered or otherwise studied it.
This list does not include astronomical objects named after mythological or fictional characters.
Comet names are often given for the astronomer(s) who discovered it, but they can also be for scientists who gave significant contributions towards their study.
In most cases, the named individual was the person who discovered the galaxy, who first brought attention to it, or who first studied it scientifically. Many of the brighter galaxies visible from the
Northern Hemisphere have
Messier numbers, named after
Charles Messier. There are a few other comprehensive catalogs that assign the cataloguer's name to galaxies. For instance,
Markarian galaxies, named after
Benjamin Markarian, are galaxies with excess blue and ultraviolet emission;[5] galaxies in the
Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies are assigned an Arp number after
Halton Arp who produced the catalog; etc. Objects in these catalogs are excluded below, except in cases where they carry the name of an additional person.
Donatiello I is a dwarf spheroidal galaxy about 10.7 million light-years, close to NGC404. It is named after the Italian amateur astronomer Giuseppe Donatiello. Donatiello discovered three more NGC 253 satellite galaxies in 2020, named Donatiello II, Donatiello III and Donatiello IV [A&A 652, A48 (2021)].
Baxendell's Unphotographable Nebula is an apparently nonexistent nebula located near
Messier 2 in
Aquarius, named after
Joseph Baxendell who first "discovered" it.[6][7]
Gabriela Mistral Nebula is the combination of open cluster
NGC 3324 and emission nebula IC 2599 in
Carina, named after the Chilean poet
Gabriela Mistral.
Gomez's Hamburger (IRAS 18059-3211) is a potentially young star surrounded by a protoplanetary disk in
Sagittarius, named after Arturo Gómez.
Hubble volume, a spherical region of the observable universe surrounding an observer beyond which objects recede from that observer at a rate greater than the speed of light due to the expansion of the universe, named after
Edwin Hubble.
9Spitch is a gravitationally lensed system of two galaxies in Cetus. It is named after Zbigniew "Zbish" Chetnik. The term Spitch comes from Chetnik's nickname Zbish, after a BBC producer misheard his nickname.
This is a list of astronomical objects named after people. While topological features on
Solar System bodies — such as craters, mountains, and valleys — are often named after famous or historical individuals, many stars and
deep-sky objects are named after the individual(s) who discovered or otherwise studied it.
This list does not include astronomical objects named after mythological or fictional characters.
Comet names are often given for the astronomer(s) who discovered it, but they can also be for scientists who gave significant contributions towards their study.
In most cases, the named individual was the person who discovered the galaxy, who first brought attention to it, or who first studied it scientifically. Many of the brighter galaxies visible from the
Northern Hemisphere have
Messier numbers, named after
Charles Messier. There are a few other comprehensive catalogs that assign the cataloguer's name to galaxies. For instance,
Markarian galaxies, named after
Benjamin Markarian, are galaxies with excess blue and ultraviolet emission;[5] galaxies in the
Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies are assigned an Arp number after
Halton Arp who produced the catalog; etc. Objects in these catalogs are excluded below, except in cases where they carry the name of an additional person.
Donatiello I is a dwarf spheroidal galaxy about 10.7 million light-years, close to NGC404. It is named after the Italian amateur astronomer Giuseppe Donatiello. Donatiello discovered three more NGC 253 satellite galaxies in 2020, named Donatiello II, Donatiello III and Donatiello IV [A&A 652, A48 (2021)].
Baxendell's Unphotographable Nebula is an apparently nonexistent nebula located near
Messier 2 in
Aquarius, named after
Joseph Baxendell who first "discovered" it.[6][7]
Gabriela Mistral Nebula is the combination of open cluster
NGC 3324 and emission nebula IC 2599 in
Carina, named after the Chilean poet
Gabriela Mistral.
Gomez's Hamburger (IRAS 18059-3211) is a potentially young star surrounded by a protoplanetary disk in
Sagittarius, named after Arturo Gómez.
Hubble volume, a spherical region of the observable universe surrounding an observer beyond which objects recede from that observer at a rate greater than the speed of light due to the expansion of the universe, named after
Edwin Hubble.
9Spitch is a gravitationally lensed system of two galaxies in Cetus. It is named after Zbigniew "Zbish" Chetnik. The term Spitch comes from Chetnik's nickname Zbish, after a BBC producer misheard his nickname.