New Horizons to flyby Pluto this year

[Serendipity]

And guess what? Pluto has blue skies!!!!

One of latest photos...

Apparently they think it's due to the Sun's ultraviolet light interacting with the planetoid's nitrogen atmosphere to produce tholins.

 

[Parson]

Am I wrong in thinking that there would not be enough light for Pluto to glow like that, at least with normal eyesight?

 

[Vertigo]

I think you're probably right there, Parson. I suspect all these images are taken with cameras a lot more sensitive than our eyes.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I think the sky is black on Pluto, very thin atmosphere. At sunrise and sunset you might see the blue glow. That photo is only possible when you are travelling beyond Pluto. Not possible to see that from the sun ward side.

 

[Serendipity]

The latest assessment of Pluto can be found at http://www.sciencemag.org/content/350/6258/aad1815.full
Amongst other things they've come to the conclusion that there must a small amount of radioactive decay at the core - I'm personally not convinced.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

What I didn't realise until recently is that it is going to continue, rendezvousing with a Kuiper Belt object: New Horizons is expected to encounter 2014 MU69 on January 1, 2019. Amazinger and amazinger!

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Kerberos and Pluto's other moons
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-34615229

 

[Ray McCarthy]

New target after 16 minute motor / engine fire
www.theregister.co.uk/2015/10/23/new_horizon_aims_new_target/

 

[Stephen Palmer]

We live in extraordinary times.

 

[Serendipity]

Hm... and more pictures keep on coming in. And now there's fog!!!

http://space.io9.com/sunset-on-pluto-is-beyond-gorgeous-in-latest-photos-fro-1731433085

If you follow through the various links from this you find the atmosphere is layered... my mind's off to have another boggle...

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Last engine firing (burn) for Kuiper belt target.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/11/08/new_horizons_makes_last_burn_for_kuiper_belt_target/

 

[Parson]

I sincerely hope this project gets funded, but pure science often gets short shrift in National budgets, which can find money to subsidize all kinds of less worthy endeavors.

 

[Serendipity]

And now we have volcanoes on Pluto... see http://www.theguardian.com/science/...could-be-ice-spewing-volcanoes-scientists-say ... no surprises there... at least for me...

 

[Ray McCarthy]

It's amazing ...

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/11/10/ice_volcanoes_just_part_of_plutonic_pandemonium/

The moon orbits

The other surprise is that even given predictions that Pluto and its small moons would have messy orbits, they're much more chaotic than expected. NASA's provided an animation (below), which New Horizons team member Mark Showalter (author of the animation) described as “pandemonium”.

Youtube Video

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Sharpest photos yet?
New Horizons: Sharpest images of Pluto's surface - BBC News

 

[BAYLOR]

Incredible.

 

[Parson]

It is a set of amazing photos, letting us know how similar and yet utterly alien the surface of Pluto is. Wow! just wow!

 

[BigBadBob141]

Wow, wow and wow again!!!!!!!!!

 

[Vertigo]

Fascinating that even Pluto's rather tenuous atmosphere appears to be enough to raise ripples/dunes on the Sputnik Planum. They must be moderately large to be so visible at that range.

 

[REBerg]

Does the amazing and enormous heart-shaped feature on Pluto's surface hold any significance? A message left for Humanity when it reached the very edge of the solar system, like Clarke's monoliths?

Not for hard-edged scientists, probably, but for science fiction fans and other dreamers?