New Horizons. Why the New Horizons mission to Pluto is so important for humanity
The full New Horizons mission is expected to last 15-17 years.
New Horizons left the area at the fastest speed of any spacecraft. At the moment the engines were turned off, it was 16.26 km/s (relative to the Earth). The heliocentric speed was 45 km/s, which would allow New Horizons to escape even without a gravity assist maneuver near Jupiter. However, in 2015, the heliocentric speed of the device was about 14.5 km/s, which is less than the speed of Voyager 1 - 17.012 km/s (Voyager 1 gained greater speed due to the additional gravitational maneuver y).
Mission Goals
The main goals of the mission are to study the formation of the Pluto-Charon system, the formation of the Kuiper belt, and the processes that occurred in the early stages of evolution solar system. The spacecraft will study the surface and atmosphere of objects in the Pluto system, the immediate environment of Pluto. Similar studies are possible for Kuiper belt objects in the extended mission.
In particular, the following scientific observations will be made:
- Mapping the surface of Pluto and Charon
- Study of the geology and morphology of Pluto and Charon
- Study of Pluto's atmosphere and its dispersion into the surrounding space
- Searching for the atmosphere of Charon
- Constructing a surface temperature map of Pluto and Charon
- Search for rings and new satellites of Pluto
- Study of Kuiper Belt Objects
The science
The day before, the New Horizons spacecraft made the first ever flyby of Pluto, collecting data from this dwarf planet and its moons.
After spending more than 9.5 years in space, the device made its closest approach to Pluto, being at a distance of 12,500 km from its surface.
This event will forever remain in history as the moment when humanity first visited Pluto. Here are a few interesting facts about the New Horizons mission to Pluto.
Spaceship "New Horizons"
1. New Horizons is the fastest spacecraft ever launched.
In 2006, the Atlas 5 rocket launched New Horizons into space. At the third stage of separation, the device moved at a speed of 16 km per second. To put this speed into perspective, it took the Apollo astronauts 3 days to get to the Moon, but New Horizons would have covered the same distance in 9 hours.
2. When New Horizons launched, Pluto was still a planet.
When the spacecraft was launched, scientists were already expressing doubts about Pluto's status as a planet. This was prompted by the discovery of an object similar in size to Pluto, Eris, discovered in 2005.
Scientists had to decide whether Eris would become the 10th planet, or whether changes should be made to the definition of the term “planet.”
Ultimately, Pluto was declassified as a planet 8 months after the launch of New Horizons.
3. Jupiter's gravity had a slingshot effect on the probe.
Gravity maneuver implies that a spacecraft flying near a planet uses the planet's gravity to change speed or direction, as if it were launched with a huge slingshot.
Jupiter's gravity launched New Horizons, increasing its speed to 83,700 km per hour. Passing through the Jovian system, the device for the first time captured such a phenomenon as lightning near the poles of Jupiter.
4. On board are the ashes of the man who discovered Pluto.
In 1930 Clyde Tombaugh(Clyde Tombaugh) - an American astronomer from the Lowell Observatory discovered a planet that was later named Pluto. Tombaugh died in 1997, and some of his ashes are on board New Horizons. His last wish was to send his ashes into space.
When the spacecraft passes beyond the Kuiper Belt, the astronomer's ashes will be the first to cross the solar system. Also on board the probe there is a CD with names of 434,000 people, who participated in the "Send your name to Pluto" campaign.
Photo of Pluto from New Horizons
5. Scientists consider Pluto "the scientific world of wonders."
The team of Johns Hopkins University scientists who manage the New Horizons mission for NASA describe the Pluto system as a "scientific world of wonders."
In addition to mapping geology and morphology, analyzing the atmosphere and weather, the probe will also explore Pluto's largest moon, Charon. These two celestial bodies revolving around the same center of gravity constitute the only one binary system in the solar system. For the first time, we will be able to study this new class of planets known as "ice dwarfs."
6. The entire mission used less energy than a 100-watt light bulb.
This spacecraft uses radioisotope thermoelectric generator(RTG) is a kind of plutonium power plant.
Like a thermos, the device is wrapped in a thermal protective coating to trap the heat generated by the probe's electronics and keep it at a stable temperature. RTG does not provide jet propulsion, and the probe flies at the speed created during launch and with the help of Jupiter's gravity.
7. Data is sent to Earth at a speed of 2 kbit/sec.
The spacecraft uses a huge antenna to communicate with Deep space communication network NASA. It's not like that simple task: A beam just 0.3 degrees wide should hit Earth from Pluto and beyond. It takes 4 hours for the data to reach the spacecraft, and when the flyby is over, more will be needed 16 months to send all data to Earth.
New Horizons Mission to Pluto 2015
8. There is virtually no room for error.
New Horizons covered a distance of almost 4.8 billion kilometers, traveling at a speed of approximately 50,000 km per hour. If, due to orbital mechanics, it deviates just 100 seconds to the side, it will not be able to collect all the necessary scientific data. Think about it: a small deviation that could erase 9.5 years of flight.
9. New satellites may pose new dangers.
In 2011, New Horizons discovered a second moon orbiting Pluto - Kerber, and after a third year - Styx. This was an exciting and disturbing discovery.
These satellites do not have enough mass and gravity to contain debris resulting from planetary collisions that could fall onto the spacecraft. However, the debris does not need to be large to pose a hazard. Even a particle the size of a grain of rice can be catastrophic for the probe as it moves at such high speeds.
10. The New Horizons mission doesn't stop at Pluto.
Once the spacecraft passes Pluto, it will have enough energy to continue its journey to Kuiper belts- a huge region of icy bodies and mysterious small objects orbiting beyond Neptune.
These objects are building material for Pluto and similar planets. New Horizons will have to travel more than a billion kilometers beyond Pluto.
New Horizons may be considered one of NASA's most ambitious missions in recent times. The interplanetary station was launched in January 2006, and a year later it ended up near Jupiter. The gravitational maneuver around the giant planet allowed the device to accelerate, and as a result, in almost 8 years, New Horizons flew to Pluto, covering a distance 32 times greater than from the Earth to the Sun. The distance is really colossal, and information from the device’s transmitting devices arrives very slowly: about 1 kilobyte per second. According to NASA experts, all spectographic, photographic, isometric data about Pluto and its satellites, which have accumulated on two on-board flash drives, will be transmitted for more than a year (about 470 days).
Its size is larger than expected
Photo: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
Because of its atmosphere (albeit quite thin), scientists could not determine the exact size of Pluto. Adequate data were obtained only when sufficiently close to the planet. New Horizons indicated its exact diameter - 2370 km (for comparison: this is less than the distance from Moscow to Omsk). But it turned out to be clearly larger than previously thought. The discovery immediately excited supporters of the idea that Pluto should once again be recognized as a full-fledged (and not a dwarf, as it is now considered) planet.
Proponents of recognizing Pluto as a dwarf planet, in turn, argued that it is only one of many similar objects in the Kuiper belt (an area similar to the asteroid belt, where material remaining after the formation of the Solar system accumulated) and not even the largest of them - Eris at that moment was considered larger. Therefore, calling it a planet in the full sense of the word, such as, for example, Mercury, is inappropriate. But the emerging fact that Pluto is larger than Eris is unlikely to undermine the argument and provide an opportunity to appeal the status. Moreover, in the Kuiper belt there are new dwarf planets every now and then, and some may turn out to be larger than Pluto and Eris. In addition, Eris is still larger than Pluto in mass, since it is much denser.
The real color of its surface
Photo: NASA/APL/SWRI
Few people realized that the photos of Pluto that went viral on social networks do not reflect the realistic colors of the planet's landscapes. The colors in the photographs were specially enhanced using filters to show the difference in the structure of the surface. This helped scientists understand chemical composition ice, and also estimate the age of geological objects. All this can further show scientists how space weather affected surface dynamics.
What color is Pluto's surface really? Back in 2002, when space telescope Hubble took pictures of the distant planet, researchers suggested that it has a red-brown color. After detectors installed on New Horizons produced more detailed color images, these guesses were confirmed. Possible explanations have also emerged: the reddish-brown color is most likely the result of a chemical process between methane molecules in Pluto's atmosphere and certain ultraviolet radiation, emitted by the Sun and distant galaxies. The same phenomenon is observed on Saturn's moon Titan and Neptune's moon Triton.
Strange lack of craters
Photo: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
Upon closer examination of the first images of the surface, researchers were especially surprised by the absence of craters on Pluto. It is known that most of the planets in the solar system are completely pitted with dents formed as a result of bombardment by asteroids. Planets without craters (or with a minimal number of them) - Earth, Venus and Mars - are geologically active, so the resulting craters are covered with more and more new layers of rock. Thus, scientists have suggested that the surface of Pluto cannot be older than 100 million years, which by geological standards (the planet itself was formed 4.5 billion years ago) is a relatively short period.
Possible geological activity
Photo: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
Geological activity must be fueled by something. But what could Pluto be heating up? On many planets (including Earth), there is a slow process of decay of radioactive materials, which provide heat to the interior. But Pluto is too small to accommodate enough of these materials. Typically, small planets with active geology, such as Jupiter's moon Europa, heat up from the inside due to the phenomenon of tidal acceleration. The planet compresses and unclenches like a tennis ball, now approaching and now moving away from larger objects. But this is unlikely to happen with Pluto, since there are no major planets capable of influencing him.
Alternative hypotheses suggest that Pluto may have an underground ocean that cools, releasing heat very, very slowly. It could also be that the surface ice found on the planet is a kind of blanket that slows the rate at which internal heat is lost.
All of these questions are of particular interest because the answers to them may apply to many other planets.
Heart Nature on Pluto
Photo: dorkly.com
New Horizons cameras made it possible to see a spot on Pluto in the shape of a huge heart. This romantic detail contributed to the viral spread of the picture across networks. It was found that the heart spot was formed as a result of a powerful collision many millions of years ago. The giant depression is likely filled with frozen gases - nitrogen, methane and carbon dioxide.
The researchers were also very surprised by the vast mountain ranges of ice. The height of some peaks reaches 3 km, and this is another indication of possible geological activity.
Unusual atmosphere
Animation simulating a flyby of Pluto's mountains, which was created from New Horizons photographs
The New Horizons spectrometer was able to capture nitrogen atoms that were part of Pluto's atmosphere. Moreover, they were located at a distance exceeding seven radii of the dwarf planet - this is much further than calculations show. No other elements could be detected, from this it was concluded that Pluto has the purest nitrogen atmosphere of all the planets in the solar system.
The study of the particles also led to the conclusion that they are escaping from the atmosphere faster than expected. The outflow of part of the atmosphere was known earlier; the same process occurred with the Earth billions of years ago. It is believed that getting rid of excess nitrogen contributed to the development of life on our planet.
Satellites
Photo: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
The New Horizons flyby collected data and detailed images of Pluto's five moons, including Charon, the largest. Before this, objects appeared only as dim points of light.
Charon, considered a faceless ball of ice, turned out to be a whole world with rocks, depressions, and deep crevices (one of them deeper than the Grand Canyon). Although the satellite has craters, there are also fewer of them than expected, which means there is a chance of geological activity. The satellite has a large, mysterious dark spot, which researchers found to be a complete surprise. This is probably a crater formed a long time ago, and for a long time it could fill with gases.
Photo: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
Curious details have become known about Nix and Hydra, two more of the five satellites. Nikta, resembling fruit gum measuring 42 by 36 km, has a mysterious red spot (according to assumptions - a crater), and Hydra is shaped like a giant gray mitten 55 by 40 km. Photos of the other two satellites, Kerberos and Styx, will not be received until mid-October.
The New Horizons mission team organized a press conference on July 17, 2015 at 20:00 Moscow time, at which they reported the latest data about Pluto and its system received from the automatic interplanetary station. Scientists on the dwarf planet discovered an icy plain with unusual geology, possible evidence of the presence of winds and geysers on the former ninth planet, as well as a plasma tail, and estimated the size of what turned out to be a gigantic atmosphere of Pluto. Together with NASA, Science and New Scientist, Lenta.ru talks about this and future exploration of distant worlds.
Geology
Scientists presented high-resolution photographs of Pluto's surface. They show interesting geological features of the dwarf planet - lumpy hills above the plains, a ribbed surface of the ice fields, probably due to erosion, as well as channels delimiting the ice plains. Special attention attracted by spotted dark stripes on the ice - possible traces of cryovolcanism, geyser eruptions, the same as those observed in 1989 on Neptune’s satellite, Triton.
More and more evidence is accumulating indicating that geological processes are still actively occurring on Pluto, and not just simple temperature fluctuations and changes in wind speed in its rarefied atmosphere. If the dwarf planet were a quiet world, high ice mountains would not form on its plains, but traces of impact craters would be visible.
These ice rocks, according to scientists, could have formed a hundred million years ago, and several weeks before the station’s approach to Pluto. Something causes the water ice that mountains are largely made of to rise in defiance of gravity. And scientists did not at all expect to see such a plain as.
When the New Horizons station flew in the shadow of a dwarf planet, it was possible to analyze its atmosphere. In particular, it was discovered that of its two models - turbulent and calm, most likely the second one corresponds to reality. The data obtained indicate that the wind speed at the surface of Pluto is 1-2 meters per second. This is enough to move the smallest particles of ice.
Image: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI
Wind likely contributes to erosion on Pluto's surface. However, this does not answer the question of how, for example, Mount Norgay was formed, a video of a flyby over which was shown by NASA. It is surrounded by an icy plain, and it is unclear how susceptible the mountain is to erosion processes.
The nature of the polygonal channels delimiting segments of the ice plain is also unclear. They could have arisen as a result of cooling and subsequent compression, or formed as a result of convection of matter from the interior of the dwarf planet into its atmosphere.
Scientists were also surprised to discover that the Sputnik Plateau is covered with a layer of ice from carbon monoxide. Its exact thickness is unknown, however, according to available data, it is clearly more than one centimeter. If not much more, then most likely it is an analogue of water snow.
However, it did not necessarily fall from above. Scientists do not rule out that “snow” could have gotten onto the plateau from the bowels of the planet, in particular from geysers. The wind could spread the substance from the geysers evenly across the plateau.
NASA images published on July 15 show a 3.5-kilometer-high mountain on the surface of the dwarf planet. It is located in the middle of a plain, and there are no visible traces of impact craters around. This also indicates active geological processes on the surface of Pluto.
Previously, astronomers believed that high mountains on small celestial bodies(in particular, the satellites of giant planets) are formed as a result of their gravitational interaction with larger bodies. Since there are no such in the immediate vicinity of Pluto, this mechanism does not work for it. This means that it may not work for other bodies in the Solar System.
Scientists believed that active geological processes could not occur in such a distant and cold object as Pluto, which arose billions of years ago. Probably, the source of energy for them is the internal heat released as a result of radioactive reactions in the bowels of the celestial body.
Larry Cederbloom of the US Geological Survey in Flagstaff in northern Arizona, who once participated in the Voyager mission, noted the similarities and differences between Pluto and Triton, Neptune's largest moon. According to a popular point of view, Triton was previously located, like Pluto, in the Kuiper belt, but was then captured by Neptune and became its satellite. On Triton, scientists also suggest the existence of cryovolcanism, but as a source internal heat tidal influence from Neptune is indicated. In addition, Triton, like Pluto, has few craters, but Neptune's moon does not have high mountains.
New Horizons is a NASA spacecraft launched as part of the New Frontiers program and designed to study Pluto and its moon Charon. New Horizons was the first in history to transmit color images of a dwarf planet and will be the first to study it thoroughly. The device left the vicinity of the Earth at the fastest speed among known devices. The device was launched in January 2006 and almost ten years later, by the summer of 2015, it will reach Pluto. In total, the mission is designed until 2026.
At the beginning of 2019, the New Horizons spacecraft flew past the most distant object studied by people - . At the end of January, researchers showed a qualitative one of which everyone was under the impression that it had the shape of a dumbbell. It turned out that this idea was wrong - new photos showed that the object has a flattened shape, with one of the parts much thinner than the other.
The dwarf planet Pluto is revealed to be a complex, geologically diverse world whose surface has been actively changing over billions of years. About this, collected spacecraft" ". An eclectic mix of mountains, valleys and plains covers Pluto's surface. The dwarf planet's surface composition is as vast as the world's geography. Scientists are gradually coming to the conclusion that Pluto may be one of the most unique objects in the outer solar system.