Miranda is the smallest and innermost of Uranus

Uranus

Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It has the third-largest planetary radius and fourth-largest planetary mass in the Solar System. It is named after the ancient Greek deity of the sky Uranus , the father of Cronus and grandfather of Zeus...

' five major moon

Natural satellite

A natural satellite or moon is a celestial body that orbits a planet or smaller body, which is called its primary. The two terms are used synonymously for non-artificial satellites of planets, of dwarf planets, and of minor planets....

s.

It was discovered by Gerard Kuiper

Gerard Kuiper

Gerard Peter Kuiper , Netherlands – December 24, 1973, Mexico City) was a Dutch-American astronomer after whom the Kuiper belt was named.-Early life:...

 on February 16, 1948 at McDonald Observatory

McDonald Observatory

The McDonald Observatory is an astronomical observatory located near the unincorporated community of Fort Davis in Jeff Davis County, Texas, United States. The facility is located on Mount Fowlkes and Mount Locke in the Davis Mountains of West Texas...

. It was named after Miranda

Miranda (Shakespeare)

In Shakespeare's play The Tempest, Miranda is the beautiful daughter of the old Duke Prospero.Cast away with her father since she was three years old, she has lived an extremely sheltered existence. Though she has received a well-rounded education from her father, she is desperately lacking in real...

 from William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

's play The Tempest by Kuiper in his report of the discovery. The adjectival form of the name is Mirandan. It is also designated Uranus V.

So far the only close-up images of Miranda are from the Voyager 2

Voyager 2

The Voyager 2 spacecraft is a 722-kilogram space probe launched by NASA on August 20, 1977 to study the outer Solar System and eventually interstellar space...

probe, which made observations of the moon during its Uranus flyby in January, 1986.