By Paul Scott Anderson, on March 21st, 2016
High-resolution view of Pluto from New Horizons. The large smoother area of ice in Sputnik Planum is the western lobe of the “heart” feature. Image Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI
Pluto is a tiny world in the outer fringes of the Solar System; for many decades it was only a mere speck of light in even […]
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By Paul Scott Anderson, on December 4th, 2015
New high-resolution image of Pluto from New Horizons, showing jumbled blocks in the water-ice crust, which border the smooth nitrogen-ice plains. Image Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI
The New Horizons mission has already sent back phenomenal images and data from Pluto, but it keeps getting better. New images released today are the first in a series […]
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By Paul Scott Anderson, on November 9th, 2015
Slide from the DPS meeting showing possible ice volcanoes on Pluto. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
Pluto is a small, cold world, but it is also turning out to be one of the most fascinating places in our Solar System – as reported today at the American Astronomical […]
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By Paul Scott Anderson, on September 10th, 2015
Perspective view of Pluto, composed of the latest high-resolution images. The entire expanse of terrain seen in the image is 1,100 miles (1,800 kilometers) across. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
After a lull of several weeks, the downlinking of new data from the New Horizons spacecraft has begun, […]
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By Ben Evans, on July 12th, 2015 Whether a dwarf planet, plutoid, trans-Neptunian object or Kuiper Belt object, Pluto has emerged from the gloom to reveal her secrets. Image Credit: NASA-JHUAPL-SWRI
We’re nearly there.
Eighty-five years after it was first identified by U.S. astronomer Clyde Tombaugh and subsequently named by English schoolgirl Venetia Burney, 39 years since its surface was […]
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By Ben Evans, on July 11th, 2015 Artist’s concept of the New Horizons spacecraft during its planned encounter with Pluto and its moon, Charon. Image Credit: NASA
After 9.5 years, 114 months, more than 490 weeks, and around 3,500 days since launch, NASA’s New Horizons mission is now into double-figure-hours as it initiates the final countdown toward a historic rendezvous […]
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By Ben Evans, on July 9th, 2015 An artist’s depiction of New Horizons encountering a Kuiper Belt Object (KBO). Image Credit: Johns Hopkins University APL/Southwest Research Institute (JHUAPL/SwRI)
Tomorrow morning, less than 100 hours will remain before the first machine fashioned by human hands completes the initial reconnaissance of the last of the Solar System’s “traditional” nine planets. NASA’s New […]
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By Ben Evans, on July 8th, 2015 An artist’s depiction of New Horizons encountering a Kuiper Belt Object (KBO). Image Credit: Johns Hopkins University APL/Southwest Research Institute (JHUAPL/SwRI)
Earlier this week, NASA released the latest images of the Pluto-Charon binary system, as the New Horizons spacecraft—newly recovered following a brief and heart-stopping loss of communications last weekend—approaches its quarry, more […]
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By Ben Evans, on July 5th, 2015 After a 9.5-year voyage across the Solar System, New Horizons is just days away from humanity’s first close-up reconnaissance of the last of the traditionally accepted nine planets. Image Credit: NASA
Less than 10 days and a mere 7.2 million miles (11.6 million km) from its quarry—the dwarf world Pluto, its binary companion […]
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By Ben Evans, on June 28th, 2015 Technicians working on the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility (PHSF) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The black shape of the Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (RTG) is clearly visible at left. Photo Credit: NASA/KSC
Sixteen days from now, the first robotic emissary from Earth will encounter the dwarf world […]
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