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The full moon seen in May has been given many names by the world’s cultures.

The Chinese called it the dragon moon; the Choctaws called it the panther moon; the Cherokee called it the planting moon; the Celts called it the bright moon.

Come tonight and Sunday morning you can call it the honking big moon. Or a “supermoon.”

Additionally, the celestial event has more than a visual component. Earth’s tides are affected and some in the medical community say births, as well as moods, may be moved by this lunar event.

The moon that rises in the night sky tonight will be at the year’s closest point to the Earth — called the lunar perigee — and will appear larger than usual, said Carol Stewart, a program presenter and NASA/Jet Propulsion Lab solar system ambassador at the Calusa Nature Center and Planetarium.

The term perigee — and it’s opposite, apogee — refer to the distance from the Earth to the moon. Perigee is the closest the moon gets to Earth and the stage the moon appears larger while apogee is the farthest point from Earth.

Because there is little in the sky near the moon, getting a good handle on the size can be difficult.

“The moon will appear larger, to the eye,” than the moon at it’s farthest point, Stewart said.

The Southwest Florida Astronomical Society’s website lists this full moon as “the closest and largest full moon of 2012” while NASA’s Science News for this week says “the full Moon of May 5-6, 2012, is a perigee moon, as much as 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter than other full moons of 2012.”

The average distance from Earth is 237,700 miles. Sunday’s full moon at perigee will be 221,800 miles away. Apogee this year comes just 13 days later, on May 19, when the moon will be in a waning crescent phase and 252,556 miles away.

There are documented and undocumented physical effects to these apogee and perigee points.

For example, the effect on the Earth’s tides, explained by the National Oceanic and Asmospheric Administration, is: Once a month, when the moon is closest to the Earth (at perigee), tide-generating forces are higher than usual, producing above-average ranges in the tides. About two weeks later, when the moon is farthest from the Earth (at apogee), the lunar tide-raising force is smaller, and the tidal ranges are less than average.