Almost four million km of Pluto, New Horizons spacecraft took the pictures of four dark areas on the surface of Pluto, whose nature fascinates scientists.
The spots are located on the hemisphere of Pluto constantly facing its largest moon, Charon. This page will be invisible to the probe when it flew by in the early afternoon on July 14. Head of the New Horizons science team, Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, describes a photograph provided by the probe as a “last, best look at this part of Pluto over the coming decades”.
The spots seem to be connected with a dark stripe in the equatorial regions of Pluto. Researchers intrigued by their similar size and regular spacing. A scientist involved in the mission, Curt Niebur of NASA headquarters in Washington, said that “it is strange that they are arranged so regularly.” Also, Jeff Moore (NASA Ames Research Center, California) concluded that “it is not known whether they are highlands, plains, or simply areas with different brightness on a completely flat surface”.
The diameter of each of the mysterious areas is estimated to be about 480 kilometers, which corresponds to the area of about three-quarters of Polish territory. The new images showed that the structure of these areas is much more complex than suggested by previous photo provided by the probe, and their border very clear, with a complicated course.
During the flight in the vicinity of Pluto, New Horizons spacecraft will be observe the opposite hemisphere of the planet. New Horizons przemknie at a distance of 12,400 kilometers from the surface of the former planet at a speed of 14 km / s, July 14 at 13:50 CET. 14 minutes later will be close to Charon 27000 km distance.
He added: Dominik Gronkiewicz – 2015-07-12 02: 20: 27 + 02
Source: NASA – American Space Agency
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time the news was added: 2015-07-12 02: 20: 27 + 02
Time last updated: 2015-07-12 2:20:27 02
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