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The geology of Pluto consists of the characteristics of the surface, crust, and interior of Pluto. Because of Pluto's distance from Earth, in-depth study from Earth is difficult. Many details about Pluto remained unknown until 14 July 2015, when New Horizons flew through the Pluto system and began transmitting data back to Earth. [1]
Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Sun. It is the largest known trans-Neptunian object by volume, by a small margin, but is less massive than Eris.
A map of Pluto showing the names officially approved by the IAU as of 3 February 2021.. This is a list of named geological features on Pluto, identified by scientists working with data from the New Horizons spacecraft.
[6] [a] Charon and Pluto are also tidally locked, so that they always present the same face toward each other. The IAU General Assembly in August 2006 considered a proposal that Pluto and Charon be reclassified as a double planet, but the proposal was abandoned. [7] Like Pluto, Charon is a perfect sphere to within measurement uncertainty. [8]
By the time the New Horizons spacecraft was conducting its highest-resolution observations, the mountain was in darkness, having rotated past Pluto's terminator.Although some images were able to be taken past the line of darkness using sunlight reflected by Pluto's atmospheric haze layers, much less can be told about it than neighboring sunlit regions.
The geography of Pluto refers to the study and mapping of physical features across the dwarf planet Pluto. On 14 July 2015, the New Horizons spacecraft became the first spacecraft to fly by Pluto. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] During its brief flyby, New Horizons made detailed geographical measurements and observations of Pluto and its moons .
An enhanced-color view of Pluto with Wright Mons's location marked. Wright Mons is located in Pluto's southern hemisphere [1] within the roughly 400 by 700 kilometer-wide (250 by 435 miles-wide) Hyecho Palus, a walled low-lying plain and one of the lowest-altitude regions on Pluto.
Salacia (minor-planet designation: 120347 Salacia) is a large trans-Neptunian object (TNO) in the Kuiper belt, approximately 850 km (530 mi) in diameter.It was discovered on 22 September 2004, by American astronomers Henry Roe, Michael Brown and Kristina Barkume at the Palomar Observatory in California, United States.