Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Kuiper belt


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 01:10, 7 July 2007.

Kuiper belt
Nominating for FA as per GA listing. Serendipodous 05:47, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I removed the empty listing at peer review; see the instructions at both WP:PR and WP:FAC, articles shouldn't be listed at both places. Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 06:21, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Support: I was the GA reviewer of the article and found the article a good read. There are a few comments though -
 * redlinks: either create atleast stub wikipages or remove wikilink - "1993 SC", "Steven H Pravdo", "Michael D Hicks", "Anne S Descour" check
 * lead section, para 2 - "at least one dwarf planet." - either wikilink to the dwarf planet or modify it as "at least one dwarf planet (Pluto)". check
 * if possible, can you add the list of comets known to originate from kuiper belt. --Kalyan 06:39, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
 * It would be one heck of a list. Still, I can add it to external links Serendipodous 07:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Support Fixes needed -ok, the lead is big enough, but surely the info could be streamlined into 3 paras rather than 6 segments? More to come. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:39, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

In 1977, Charles Kowal, using a blink comparator, the same device that had allowed Clyde Tombaugh to discover Pluto nearly 50 years before, discovered 2060 Chiron, an icy planetoid with an orbit between Saturn and Uranus. - 5 commas, ouch! Try "In 1977 Charles Kowal discovered an icy planetoid in an orbit between Saturn and Uranus which he named 2060 Chiron; he used a blink comparator, the same device that had allowed Clyde Tombaugh to discover Pluto nearly 50 years before." - or something like it.

This led many astronomers to conclude that, much like Ceres before it, which was considered a planet before the discovery of its fellow asteroids, Pluto should be reclassified as a Kuiper belt object - change tense to "should have been reclassified" as it relates to next para. Also, streamlining th clauses would be good here too, though not as bad as previous one.

In terms of stubby sections, I was wondering whether more of the speculation (up till ref 9) could go before Hypotheses subsection to destubbify preceding Hisotry bit.

Also, is the See Also bit necessary if all are mentioned in text?

Overall a good read and the prose is good given the complexities of the discussion. Fix these and yer in...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:58, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Fixed most issues; only bit I have niggles with is "should be" vs. "should have been" ("should have been" implies that it wasn't reclassified, when it was). I shifted the paras up to "History" but I'm not sure it works. Serendipodous 22:10, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment – The majority of sizes and albedos listed in the table are speculative (assumed albedo) and should be replaced with the values from Table 4 of ref[48]. Ruslik 07:30, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I've subbed the diameters, but the table uses a different value for albedo, and I'm not sure how to translate it. Serendipodous 08:25, 2 July 2007 (UTC)


 * You should use values from the Table 4 of [48] for albedos and don't forget to change the last column of the table (I mean 'assumed albedo' to 'thermal'). In addition the geometric size determination for Quaoar can be listed together with thermal since the cause of their difference is not known.
 * Also Encke is not a Jupiter family comet. It is decoupled from Jupiter (aphelion ~ 4.1 a.u.). It is better to write short-period comet. Ruslik 10:09, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The albedo list on table 4 is in figures a hundred times larger than the figures in the article's table. Therefore it must be using different units. I don't know how to translate those units so I can't write them in. Serendipodous 10:47, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I didn't understand what you meant the last time, but I think they use %, don't they? You can read through the article to find this. Ruslik 10:56, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * OK done; I'm assuming that Pluto's albedo of 0.6 and Charon's albedo of 0.4 translate into 60 and 40 percent reflectivity. Serendipodous 11:29, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

One other thing; if Encke isn't a Jupiter family comet and it isn't a Halley family comet, then what is it? Is there another family of comets that derived from the Kuiper belt? And if so, does the "Comets" section need to be rewritten? Serendipodous 12:30, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * No need to rewrite anything. Encke is only such a comet known. It was probably scattered by Earth or some other inner planet and decoupled from Jupiter. It can be considered as a rare exception. Ruslik 13:19, 2 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Support – This is a well written, rather a comprehensive article, which cites a large number of sources. While I support its nomination, there are a few issue I want to highlight (in addition to my comments above):
 * I think the image illustrating power law is too trivial and can be removed;
 * The table of the brightest KBOs misses two objects: 2003MW12 (classical) and 2002TC302 (5:2);
 * The section about the largest KBOs should be merged with the list of the brightest KBOs, because they consider the same objects;
 * The last technical issue. As I can see the last image disturbes the table. So either the image should be moved or the table.

Ruslik 11:04, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * How's that? Also, where in the table would those two go? Serendipodous 11:17, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I noticed that you moved the table into a separate article. I agree that it is probably the best solution. By a technical issue I meant that the table was narrowed by the figure on the left. After you got rid of the table the figure interfered with the list of references. So I moved the figure. Ruslik 12:17, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * It doesn't really belong in that section, so I trimmed it and expanded the final paragraph. I can't see any interference on my browser, so I don't know if it worked or not. Serendipodous 12:42, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * It worked. Ruslik 13:56, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Oppose for now. Good-looking article, from what I've seen (I haven't read it all), but there are several redirects going to this article, including Edgeworth-Kuiper belt, EKB, etc., but this is not mentioned in the opening, leading potential readers to be confused as to why they've been directed to the "wrong" article. I've also seen this belt referred to as the "Leonard-Whipple belt", which is not discussed in this article. Firsfron of Ronchester  20:45, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The Kuiper belt is not and has never been called the "Leonard Whipple belt". That's just an idea thrown out by that one article. It is occasionally called the Edgeworth Kuiper belt, and perhaps that can be mentioned in the lead, though it is already mentioned in the section Name. Serendipodous 06:13, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm getting 20 google hits for "Whipple belt"+"Kuiper"; aside from the above link, this, and this, so it doesn't seem to be limited to "one article". However, as you've now given some weight to the Edgeworth name in the lead, I can no longer object. Firsfron of Ronchester  04:57, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The vast majority of those hits are mirrors of the same old Wiki page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Serendipodous (talk • contribs)
 * Yes, and that is why I am no longer objecting. But it's not just the one article, either. Firsfron of Ronchester  05:35, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.