New Horizons has created new color pictures of Pluto. In these pictures four spots are visible next to each other, as if someone has touched the dwarf planet with his fingers. But make no mistake: every spot has a diameter of 480 kilometers. Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg fit in area with ease in every spot.
Scientists do not yet know what these dark spots. This mystery will be unraveled in the coming weeks, now the New Horizons spacecraft is approaching Pluto. “It’s a real puzzle,” says principal investigator Alan Stern of the New Horizons project. “We can not wait to learn it.”
It is striking that Pluto has a different color than its largest moon, Charon. Pluto looks browner and lighter than Charon.
Clouds
If Pluto is clouds, which can then New Horizons spotted. “We use different techniques to detect clouds in our pictures,” says scientist Kelsi Singer of the Southwest Research Institute. “If we find clouds, then we can measure wind speed and direction.”
New raw photos
are expected later today the latest raw images of Pluto and Charon are presented on this website. We can not wait, possibly because there are a lot more details are visible on the surface of the dwarf planet. Below is the most recent photo of the duo, made on 1 July. The polar cap on Pluto is clearly visible.
New Horizons
> At present, the New Horizons spacecraft removed less than fifteen million kilometers of Pluto. On July 14, the probe skims past the dwarf planet and its moons. In the coming weeks Scientias.nl pays attention to every working day perhaps the most spectacular flyby of this century.
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