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All of the outer circumbinary moons are also close to mean motion resonance with the Charon–Pluto orbital period. Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra are in a 1:3:4:5:6 sequence of near resonances, with Styx approximately 5.4% from its resonance, Nix approximately 2.7%, Kerberos approximately 0.6%, and Hydra approximately 0.3%. [21]
Pluto (bottom left) compared in size to the Earth and the Moon. Pluto's diameter is 2 376.6 ± 3.2 km [5] and its mass is (1.303 ± 0.003) × 10 22 kg, 17.7% that of the Moon (0.22% that of Earth). [125] Its surface area is 1.774 443 × 10 7 km 2, or just slightly bigger than Russia or Antarctica (particularly including the Antarctic sea ice ...
Hydra is a natural satellite of Pluto, with a diameter of approximately 51 km (32 mi) across its longest dimension. [6] It is the second-largest moon of Pluto, being slightly larger than Nix.
Charon (moon) (1 C, 3 P) Pages in category "Moons of Pluto" The following 6 pages are in this category, out of 6 total. This list may not reflect recent changes. ...
Charon's volume and mass allow calculation of its density, 1.702 ± 0.017 g/cm 3, [13] from which it can be determined that Charon is slightly less dense than Pluto and suggesting a composition of 55% rock to 45% ice (± 5%), whereas Pluto is about 70% rock. The difference is considerably lower than that of most suspected collisional satellites.
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] When it did, Pluto was found to have remarkable geologic diversity, with New Horizons team member Jeff Moore saying that it "is every bit as complex as that of Mars". [ 2 ]
The moons of the trans-Neptunian objects (other than Charon) have not been included, because they appear to follow the normal situation for TNOs rather than the moons of Saturn and Uranus, and become solid at a larger size (900–1000 km diameter, rather than 400 km as for the moons of Saturn and Uranus).
Nix is a natural satellite of Pluto, with a diameter of 49.8 km (30.9 mi) across its longest dimension. [3] It was discovered along with Pluto's outermost moon Hydra on 15 May 2005 by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope, [1] and was named after Nyx, the Greek goddess of the night. [10]