REAL LIFE NEWS: COUNTDOWN TO PLUTO ENCOUNTER
by Hazed
The New Horizons spacecraft will fly past Pluto in just a few days – on Tuesday July 14. As it approaches the dwarf planet, we are seeing even more detailed photos, such as the one at the first source link below, taken from just under five million km away.
Scientists hope that this flyby, when it will be less than 5,000 miles away, will give them more details about Pluto’s surface. We already know that Pluto has a polar cap, but the photos it sends back will show us what the surface of the planet looks like: does it have rising peaks and deep troughs, or is the topography more undulating? The third source link below is the very latest image, released yesterday, showing even more detail than before of Pluto’s geography.
We will also find out what kind of atmosphere (if any) the dwarf planet has, and what its chemical constituents are. Another question to be answered is why Pluto’s brightness changes so much.
New Horizons should also be able to tell us a lot about Pluto’s moons: Charon, Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra.
It’s all very exciting.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-33459476
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-33428497
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150711.html
