Tag: Pluto

  • Initial Pluto flyby science results published

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    STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS & USED WITH PERMISSION This high-resolution image captured by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft combines blue, red and infrared images taken by the Ralph/Multispectral Visual Imaging Camera (MVIC). The bright expanse is the western lobe of the “heart,” informally called Sputnik Planum, which has been found to be rich in nitrogen, carbon monoxide…

  • Skies are blue and water ice is red on Pluto

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    Pluto’s haze layer shows its blue color in this picture taken by the New Horizons Ralph/Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC). The high-altitude haze is thought to be similar in nature to that seen at Saturn’s moon Titan. The source of both hazes likely involves sunlight-initiated chemical reactions of nitrogen and methane, leading to relatively small,…

  • Secrets behind Pluto’s pastels far from being answered

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    In this extended color image of Pluto taken by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, rounded and bizarrely textured mountains, informally named the Tartarus Dorsa, rise up along Pluto’s day-night terminator and show intricate but puzzling patterns of blue-gray ridges and reddish material in between. This view, roughly 330 miles (530 kilometers) across, combines blue, red and…

  • Haunting sunset vista shows foggy hazes on Pluto

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    Just 15 minutes after its closest approach to Pluto on July 14, 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft looked back toward the sun and captured this near-sunset view of the rugged, icy mountains and flat ice plains extending to Pluto’s horizon. The smooth expanse of the informally named icy plain Sputnik Planum (right) is flanked to…

  • Haunting sunset vista shows foggy hazes on Pluto

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    Just 15 minutes after its closest approach to Pluto on July 14, 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft looked back toward the sun and captured this near-sunset view of the rugged, icy mountains and flat ice plains extending to Pluto’s horizon. The smooth expanse of the informally named icy plain Sputnik Planum (right) is flanked to…

  • Scientists revel in latest Pluto close-ups

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    This synthetic perspective view of Pluto, based on the latest high-resolution images to be downlinked from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, shows what you would see if you were approximately 1,100 miles (1,800 kilometers) above Pluto’s equatorial area, looking northeast over the dark, cratered, informally named Cthulhu Regio toward the bright, smooth, expanse of icy plains…

  • Scientists eager for restart of Pluto photo pipeline

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    Four images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) were combined with color data from the Ralph instrument to create this global view of Pluto. (The lower right edge of Pluto in this view currently lacks high-resolution color coverage.) The images, taken when the spacecraft was 280,000 miles (450,000 kilometers) away, show features as…

  • The heart of Pluto in high-resolution

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    The icy plains of Pluto resolved by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft stretch as wide as Texas, enveloping mountain ranges and bizarre hilly outcrops in a mosaic revealing one lobe of the distant world’s heart-shaped reservoir of exotic frozen carbon monoxide, nitrogen and methane. The mosaic, posted here with permission, was created by Marco Di Lorenzo…

  • NASA probe finds intriguing ice flows under hazy skies on Pluto

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    This new global mosaic of Pluto was created by combining four black-and-white images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager and color data from the probe’s Ralph instrument. The LORRI images were taken July 14, when New Horizons was approximately 280,000 miles (450,000 kilometers) from Pluto. Features as small as 1.4 miles (2.2 kilometers) are…

  • Pluto’s moons Nix and Hydra resolved

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    New views of Nix and Hydra, two of Pluto’s four smallest moons, show the tiny worlds in detail for the first time. The color image of Nix is from data obtained by the Ralph instrument on New Horizons from July 14 at a range of 102,000 miles. The spacecraft’s higher-resolution LORRI instrument collected the black-and-white…