Space Exploration News

NASA’s New Horizons Uncovers Hidden Secrets of Pluto’s Atmosphere

Pluto nearly fills the frame in this image from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, taken on July 13, 2015, when the spacecraft was 476,000 miles (768,000 km) from the dwarf planet’s surface. This is the last and most detailed image sent to Earth before the spacecraft’s closest approach to Pluto on July 14. The color image has been combined with lower-resolution color information from the Ralph instrument that was acquired earlier on July 13. This view is dominated by the large, bright feature informally named the ‘heart,’ which measures around 1,000 miles (1,600 km) across. The heart’s diameter is about the same distance as from Denver to Chicago, in America’s heartland. The heart borders darker equatorial terrains, and the mottled terrain to its east (right) are complex. However, even at this resolution, much of the heart’s interior appears remarkably featureless-possibly a sign of ongoing geologic processes. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.
Jul 20, 2015 by News Staff

The Alice instrument – a lightweight (4.4 kg), low-power (4.4 Watt) imaging spectrograph aboard NASA’s New Horizons – has observed Pluto’s nitrogen-rich atmosphere as far as 1,000 miles (1,600 km) above the dwarf planet’s surface. The spacecraft has also discovered a region of ionized nitrogen tens of thousands of miles beyond the planet. This figure shows how New Horizons’ Alice instrument count rate changed over time during the...

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This image shows Pluto’s small moon Nix. NASA scientists believe we are looking at one end of moon’s elongated body. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Captures Image of Pluto’s Moon Nix

Jul 18, 2015 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft captured this view of Pluto’s small moon Nix on July 13, 2015, from a distance of about 360,000 miles (590,000 km). This...

This view of a portion of Pluto’s Sputnik Planum shows enigmatic features: the surface appears to be divided into irregularly shaped segments that are ringed by narrow troughs, some of which contain darker materials; features that appear to be groups of mounds and fields of small pits are also visible. This image was acquired on July 14 from a distance of 48,000 miles (77,000 km). Features as small as a half-mile (1 km) across are visible. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Close-Up of Pluto Reveals Very Young, Craterless Plain

Jul 17, 2015 by News Staff

According to New Horizons planetary scientists, this frozen region is no more than 100 million years old, and is possibly still being shaped by geologic...

This image of Pluto’s largest moon Charon was taken on July 13 from a distance of 289,000 miles (466,000 km). The inset is a black-and-white close-up taken on July 14. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

NASA Releases New Close-Up of Pluto’s Moon Charon

Jul 17, 2015 by News Staff

A close-up image of an area on Pluto’s largest moon Charon reveals a depression with a peak in the middle. This new image of an area on Charon has a...

New Horizons Captures Pluto’s Moons Charon and Hydra

Jul 16, 2015 by News Staff

New details of Pluto’s moons Charon and Hydra are revealed in the latest images from the spacecraft’s Long Range Reconnaissance Imager, taken on July...

This close-up image was taken about 1.5 hours before New Horizons closest approach to Pluto, when the craft was 47,800 miles (77,000 km) from the dwarf planet’s surface. The image easily resolves structures smaller than a mile across. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New, Close-Up Image of Pluto Reveals Youthful Mountains

Jul 16, 2015 by News Staff

The new image from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft shows a range of youthful mountains rising as high as 11,000 feet (3.5 km) above the dwarf planet’s...

Igneous clast named Harrison embedded in a conglomerate rock in Gale crater shows elongated light-toned feldspar crystals. The mosaic merges an image from Curiosity’s Mastcam with higher-resolution images from ChemCam’s Remote Micro-Imager. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / LANL / IRAP / U. Nantes / IAS / MSSS.

Curiosity Finds Evidence for Continental Crust on Early Mars

Jul 15, 2015 by News Staff

According to a team headed by Dr Violaine Sautter from the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France, Martian crustal components bear a strong...

This July 13, 2015, image of Pluto is presented in false colors to make differences in surface material and features easy to see. It was obtained by New Horizons’ Ralph instrument, using three filters to obtain color information, which is exaggerated in the image. The image reveals that the bright heart-shaped region of Pluto includes areas that differ in color characteristics. The western lobe, shaped like an ice-cream cone, appears peach color in this image. A mottled area on the right (east) appears bluish. Even within Pluto’s northern polar cap, in the upper part of the image, various shades of yellow-orange indicate subtle compositional differences. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Sends Signal Home

Jul 15, 2015 by News Staff

New Horizons called home around 9 p.m. EDT (6 p.m. PDT, 1 a.m. GMT Wednesday) Tuesday to tell the world it had successfully completed the historic flyby...

Pluto nearly fills the frame in this image from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, taken on July 13, 2015, when the spacecraft was 476,000 miles (768,000 km) from the dwarf planet’s surface. This is the last and most detailed image sent to Earth before the spacecraft’s closest approach to Pluto on July 14. The color image has been combined with lower-resolution color information from the Ralph instrument that was acquired earlier on July 13. This view is dominated by the large, bright feature informally named the ‘heart,’ which measures around 1,000 miles (1,600 km) across. The heart’s diameter is about the same distance as from Denver to Chicago, in America’s heartland. The heart borders darker equatorial terrains, and the mottled terrain to its east (right) are complex. However, even at this resolution, much of the heart’s interior appears remarkably featureless-possibly a sign of ongoing geologic processes. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

NASA’s New Horizons Spacecraft Arrives at Pluto

Jul 14, 2015 by News Staff

After a journey of nine and a half years through the Solar System, New Horizons made its closest approach to Pluto today, about 7,750 miles (12,470 km)...

This image of Pluto from New Horizons was received on July 8, 2015, and has been combined with color information from the spacecraft’s Ralph instrument. The image was taken on July 7, when New Horizons was 5 million miles (8 million km) from the dwarf planet. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

Watch Live on NASA TV: New Horizons Pluto Flyby

Jul 14, 2015 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons will complete a close flyby of Pluto today at 7:49 a.m. EST (4:49 a.m. PST, 11:49 a.m. GMT, 1:49 p.m. CET, 5:19 p.m. IST, 9:49 p.m....

Chasms, craters, and a dark north polar region are revealed in this image of Pluto’s largest moon Charon taken by New Horizons on July 11, 2015. The annotated version includes a diagram showing Charon’s north pole, equator, and central meridian, with the features highlighted. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

Latest Image of Pluto’s Moon Charon from New Horizons

Jul 13, 2015 by News Staff

A new image of the largest of Pluto’s five known moons shows various craters and chasms (canyons). Chasms, craters, and a dark north polar region are...

This image of Pluto reveals intriguing geologic details that are of keen interest to New Horizons team members. This image, taken early the morning of July 11, 2015, shows newly-resolved linear features above the equatorial region that intersect, suggestive of polygonal shapes. This image was captured when the spacecraft was 2.5 million miles (4 million km) from Pluto. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

NASA’s New Horizons Spacecraft Ready for Historic Pluto Flyby

Jul 13, 2015 by News Staff

After a journey of nine and a half years and three billion miles, NASA’s New Horizons is ready for a close look at the dwarf planet Pluto and its five...

New Horizons was about 3.7 million miles (6 million km) from Charon when it snapped this image on July 8, 2015. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Snaps New Image of Pluto’s Moon Charon

Jul 10, 2015 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons space probe, which will do a close flyby of the Pluto system on July 14, has sent back a new image of Charon, the largest of Pluto’s...

This image of Pluto from New Horizons was received on July 8, 2015, and has been combined with color information from the spacecraft’s Ralph instrument. The image was taken on July 7, when New Horizons was 5 million miles (8 million km) from the dwarf planet. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

Latest Image of Pluto from NASA’s New Horizons

Jul 9, 2015 by News Staff

The Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) aboard NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has snapped yet another amazing view of the dwarf planet. This image...

This map of the dwarf planet Pluto was created from images taken from June 27 to July 3 by New Horizons’ LORRI instrument, combined with color data from the space probe’s Ralph instrument. The center of the map corresponds to Pluto’s side that will be seen close-up during New Horizons’ July 14 flyby. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

NASA Scientists Create Color Map of Pluto

Jul 8, 2015 by News Staff

Scientists with NASA’s New Horizons mission have produced a color map of the dwarf planet Pluto. This map of the dwarf planet Pluto was created from...

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft obtained this image on 01 July 2015 from a distance of 7.8 million miles (12.5 million km), prior to the July 4 anomaly that sent the probe into safe mode. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Mission Releases Color Photo of Dwarf Planet Pluto

Jul 7, 2015 by News Staff

A new color image from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft shows a series of striking dark regularly-spaced spots along Pluto’s equator. NASA’s New Horizons...

New Horizons mission’s first map of the dwarf planet Pluto is in approximate true color. Left: map of the planet’s northern hemisphere composed using black-and-white images from the LORRI instrument. Right: map of Pluto’s colors created using data from the Ralph instrument. Center: combined map, produced by merging the LORRI and Ralph data. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

Another Red Planet? New Horizons Data Reveal True Color of Pluto

Jul 6, 2015 by News Staff

Planetary researchers involved in NASA’s New Horizons mission combined the latest black and white map of Pluto’s surface features with a map of the...

Rosetta NavCam image taken on 14 March 2015 at 85.7 km from the center of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko; it has been cleaned to remove the more obvious bad pixels and cosmic ray artefacts, and intensities have been scaled. Image credit: ESA / Rosetta / NAVCAM / CC BY-SA IGO 3.0.

67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko Could Harbor Alien Life, Say UK Scientists

Jul 6, 2015 by News Staff

Two planetary scientists from the UK – Prof Chandra Wickramasinghe of the Buckingham Center for Astrobiology and Dr Max Wallis of the University...

This family portrait, a composite of the Pluto system, includes the dwarf planet and its five known moons: Charon, Nix, Hydra, Kerberos and Styx. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Captures Family Portrait of Pluto System

Jul 3, 2015 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has taken an amazing photo of Pluto and its five moons: Charon, Nix, Hydra, Styx and Kerberos. This family portrait,...

New images show two very different faces of Pluto, one with a series of strange spots. About half of the dwarf planet is imaged, which means features shown near the bottom are at the equatorial line. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

NASA Scientists Release New Color Images of Pluto, Charon

Jul 2, 2015 by News Staff

Scientists with NASA’s New Horizons mission have combined black-and-white images of Pluto and its largest moon, Charon, from New Horizons’ LORRI imager...

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