The International Astronomical Union (IAU) will conduct a worldwide contest giving the public the opportunity to choose the name of up to 30 exoplanets.

Exoplanets are planets that orbit a star outside of our solar system, and were first discovered in 1994. Since then, new powerful telescopes have led to the discovery of nearly 2,000 exoplanets. IAU is the organization in charge of naming planets and other astronomical objects.

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However, many of these exoplanets have very uncreative and uninspired names such as CoRot-4 b or PSR B1620-26 b. IAU aims to change this by offering a contest for organizations around the globe to come up with names of up to 30 of the 305 most popular exoplanets in the universe.

Any astronomy-related organizations are encouraged to register with the NameExoWorlds website, and starting next month, will be asked to vote on which 30 planets will be named. Following the selection of the 30 planets, the organizations will then be able to propose names along with a 250-word explanation of their choice.

Although multiple organizations will be proposing the different names of planets, the general public will have the opportunity to vote on which name best suits the exoplanets' characteristics. So the planet that is suspected to be a carbon planet comprised mostly of diamond can potentially receive a more suitable name than "55 Cancri e."

Some organizations such as the University of Leicester in England will even give the public a chance to create their own names by conducting a survey for its local newspaper readers. The university will then select the most popular names accordingly and submit them to IAU, Gizmag reports. 

IAU has implemented certain specifications for organizations when proposing names though. Some of the requirements state that names can't exceed 16 characters, should only be one-word, and should be easily pronounceable in some language. IAU also prohibits any names of people, animals, places or events related to politics, military or religion.

The general public is expected to begin voting on the selection of exoplanet names by April of next year, while final results is expected to be announced in August 2015. 

TagsAstronomy, Exoplanets, International Astronomical Union, worldwide contest, nameexoworlds, Space