A friend asked, "What's the point, what's the big deal about Pluto?". My answer is "It's about discovery, exploration, learning something new, going where no-one has gone before."
Pluto has nitrogen lakes, fossilized frozen records of past liquid flows, active flow patterns, land mass erosion, icebergs floating on a sea of nitrogen, it has volcanoes or geysers venting gasses, marsh lands, fissures, four moons moving erratically, its a binary planetary system with Charon and has an active geologic history that cries out for an explanation. I expected Pluto to be dead like our moon but instead it is geologically active. IT'S ALIVE, IT'S ALIVE!!!
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The definition of planet set by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) states that, in the Solar System, a planet is a celestial body which:
Clearing the neighborhood is such an ambiguous statement it could mean anything. Objects like asteroids regularly impact planets hence their neighborhood is not clear. Pluto crosses Neptune's path does that make Neptune a non planet? Personally I like the definition provided by Runyon Stern and others. |
In January 2006 NASA launched this Probe named New Horizons to study the Pluto Charon system. It took nearly 10 years to reach its destination.
During New Horizons' voyage, Pluto was demoted by the IAU to non planet status because of the discovery of Eris by Mike Brown. In July of 2015 New Horizons approached the Pluto/Charon system and the adventure of discovery began. The various components on New Horizons were designed to help achieve the following objectives. |
The mission's science objectives are to
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Pluto/Charon
This is the Pluto/Charon system with four small moons. Pluto and Charon rotate around a point in space that lies outside Pluto referred to as their barycenter.
This makes them a binary planetary system, but more often than not Charon is referred to as a Pluto moon. The four small ice rock moons called Hydra, Kerberos, Nix and Styx orbit around the same gravitational point Pluto and Charon share.
Pluto is about two thirds the size of our moon with a radius of 1,189 km (diameter 2,379 km or 1,478 miles) and a density of 1.86 g/cm3. Density is really important as a density of 1 indicates water, greater than 1 means there's some rock mixed in with that water ice. |
Some nomenclature
Ellipse = oval shape, Eccentric = off center, Ecliptic plane = imaginary plane created by the orbit of the Earth around the Sun, the Ecliptic plane is 7.25 degrees off the Suns equator, Perihelion = closest to the Sun, Aphelion = farthest from the Sun, If the eccentricity of an ellipse is close to 1 (like 0.8 or 0.9), the ellipse is long and skinny. If the eccentricity is close to zero, the ellipse is more like a circle. The eccentricity of Earth's orbit is very small, so Earth's orbit is nearly circular. Earth's orbital eccentricity is less than 0.02. The orbit of Pluto is the most eccentric of any planet in our Solar System. Pluto's orbital eccentricity is 0.2488 (Mercury = 0.205). |
Pluto's orbit around the Sun is inclined to the ecliptic plane by 17 degrees.
Pluto and Charon's polar axis is tilted 118 degrees relative to their orbital plane around the Sun. This means they spin backwards relative to their orbital direction of rotation, they have a retrograde spin. Any planet tilted on their axis more than 90 degrees is in a retrograde spin. The Earth as viewed from above the North Pole spins in a counter (anti) clockwise direction in line with its orbit rotation around the Sun as do most planets, Pluto, Venus and Uranus on the other hand spin in a clockwise direction. |
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Pluto and its moon Charon have an amazing geological story.
I’m no scientist but am totally fascinated by this incredible system. As I've studied science papers related to Pluto for the past two years, I've tried to dumb it down to the point I can understand this stuff. Some of the content in these science papers are simply over my head but where I do understand the content I share it. This has had both good and bad results. I've made mistakes which can mislead but I've also made observations that have not been reported elsewhere (to my knowledge). I’m going to focus on the effect of the smooth surface of Sputnik Planitia a viscous slow flowing material which is largely frozen nitrogen with a consistency similar to tooth paste, the land and mountains are large chunks of water ice, the same water ice we have here on earth. |
Zone 1
The smooth surface in this image is flowing viscous nitrogen which has large cellular undulating mounds bounded by troughs.
Scientists think these large blocks of ice are like icebergs floating on a sea of viscous frozen nitrogen. At the center of Sputnik Planitia there are no icebergs but as we move out toward the edges some strings of icebergs form in the nitrogen troughs and follow those troughs to the edges, The outer edges of the nitrogen flow seems to show either land which is collapsed and covered in smooth nitrogen appearing as icebergs or rocks organized into circular concentric rings reducing in size the further they are from land. |
The nitrogen ocean creates an atmosphere or fog which is more dense at lower elevations this fog travels upwards into the uplands turning them into wetlands as the gasses are wrung out through a condensation effect known as an adiabatic lapse rate. As this gray fog condenses it coats the uplands and produces runoff.
In the above image clear signs of fluid flowing into SP creating circular rings can be seen this scene reminds me of the Horseshoe Falls at Niagara Falls. All of SP is a sunken basin bounded by walls of land ices 1 to 2 miles high. Technically this means Sputnik is a Planitia not a Planum as a Planum is an elevated plain or plateau and a Planitia is a sunken plain but early on NASA was calling it a Planum so sometimes Sputnik Planitia is errantly referred to as a planum. |
Zone 2
Originally I saw these two clumps as icebergs that floated up to and against the land ice forming clusters of small bergs primarily because of the umbilical cord that appears to connect them.
Now I see them more as land ice that has sunk along the edge of SP and is getting covered by the atmospheric moist gray fog. They are also likely dissolving somewhat in the warmer nitrogen fluid. It does appear as though there is an old layer of red tholin getting covered by a younger layer of atmospheric gray stuff. The red tholin develops slowly and accumulates as a sort of pollutant landing or developing on top of the surface. |