The butt (snigger) of countless jokes, Uranus is almost certainly the most unloved planet in our solar system. It always seems to get overlooked when the mission invitations go out.

Spacecraft have been sent to Mercury, Mars, Venus, Saturn and Jupiter. There is even one on its way to non-planet Pluto. Uranus has only ever qualified for the planetary equivalent of a presidential brush-by, when Voyager 2 sped past on its way to the edge of the solar system in 1986.

‘Oddball’

But Uranus (pronounced “yur-an-us” in polite astronomical circles) does not deserve its dull, or comic, reputation. In fact it is one of the most interesting, exciting and downright weird planets we know of.

“Uranus really stands out,” says University of Oxford planetary scientist, Leigh Fletcher. “It’s the oddball amongst the collection of planetary types we have.”