Pluto has a rump !
The path of New Horizons as itflew pastPluto on July 14 took it right away into the dwarf planet ’s shadow , and while this bring home the bacon a enthralling opportunity to see itsatmospherelit up by the Sun , it also allow the spacecraft to see the event of solar wind on Pluto .
What New Horizons found is that the standard atmosphere is being plunder away by the solar wind , creating a huge part of cold and dense ionized gun that extends tenner of thou of mile beyond Pluto . This essentially creates a “ trap ” or bodily cavity in the besiege solar wind instrument , which was detected between 77,000 and 109,000 klick ( 48,000 and 68,000 nautical mile ) behind Pluto .
It is mostly frame of nitrogen ion , which form a plasma tail , although scientists are n’t yet sure what shape or size this tush is . It resembles the gaseous ion tails ofcomets , which protract far behind the polar rocks as they go through the Solar System .
“ This is just a first tantalizing flavour at Pluto ’s plasm environs , ” aver carbon monoxide - investigator Fran Bagenal from the University of Colorado , Boulder , who leads the New Horizons Particles and Plasma squad , in astatement .
“ We ’ll be getting more data in August , which we can unite with the Alice and Rex atmospheric measurements to immobilise down the rate at which Pluto is losing its atmosphere . Once we know that , we ’ll be capable to reply undischarged interrogation about the phylogenesis of Pluto ’s atmosphere and surface and shape to what extent Pluto ’s solar wind interaction is like that of Mars . ”
As observe by Bagenal , this tail end is interesting because similar blood plasma tails have been establish atMars and Venus . Nitrogen ion had also been found in front of Pluto before the flyby by the Pluto Energetic Particle Spectrometer Science Investigation ( PEPSSI ) on New Horizons , indicate that the atmosphere was being lost in all directions .
Working out the atmospheric departure rate of Pluto could be important in understanding how the nanus major planet has evolved over time , and what sort of public it is today . With more dataexpectednext month , we can only wait and see what more surprise this removed worldly concern has in store for us .
