Much ado about Pluto Feature Summary
- Type:
- From Physics Research
- Title:
-
Much ado about Pluto
- Description:
- image credit: NASA, ESA, H. Weaver (JHU/APL), A. Stern (SwRI), and the HST Pluto Companion Search Team
hi-res image
Although now reclassified as a dwarf planet, Pluto is the center of a small world of its own. In addition to its large moon Charon, two more, shown above, were spotted by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2005. Check out these additional Hubble images to see the moons' positions at different times. Incidentally, Charon is so large that Pluto and Charon are sometimes referred to as a "double planet." To read about the NASA probe that will reach Pluto and Charon in 2015, see New Horizons.
For more on the controversy over Pluto's status, see NASA's Much Ado About Pluto and also Caltech astronomer Mike Brown's commentary. For the story of Pluto's discovery, see the Planetary Society's Pluto: The Discovery of a Planet.
- Image:
 - Featured:
- September 1, 2006 - September 16, 2006
|
