A team of american astronomers using the hubble space telescope have discovered that Pluto has 2 minor moons (designated S/2005 P 1 & S/2005 P 2) as well as it's major moon Charon. The discovery is changing the theory that Pluto & Charon are captured asteroids from the kuiper belt... these astronomers now believe that Pluto & Charon's co-orbit is the result of a titanic collision of 2 similar sized planetoids in the early evolution of our solar system.
Link to Hubble Article

http://dem0n.qgl.org/images/temp/plutomoons.jpg

The team will use Hubble again on March 2 to study the new moons. They hope the follow-up observations will provide information on the moons' color, as well as their size and shape, which could yield further clues about the formation and evolution of the Pluto system.

In the Hubble image, Pluto is in the center and Charon is just below it. P 1 is to the right and just below Charon. P 2 is to the right of Pluto and Charon.

Good news for the NASA New Horizons mission that is already on it's way to further explore the Pluto system.

That's no moons... it's some space stations

Dude, Charon is a badass name. Wasn't he the boss in Quake 2? OR was that Makron?

Either or, the scientist who discoevered/named Pluto's first moon, is a dead, set, cainer.

I'm just waiting for them to get a pic of the Monolith and get the message from HAL, "All these worlds are yours, except Europa"

:P

One step closer to finding the cure for cancer!


ZING

Dude, Charon is a badass name. Wasn't he the boss in Quake 2? OR was that Makron?

I think you mean Chthon... e1m7: The house of Chthon ;] but yer Charon is a cool name... guardian of the underworld!!! ;D especially compared to the temporary code name they are giving the newest biggest kuiper belt object, xena. stupid xena.

I'm just waiting for them to get a pic of the Monolith and get the message from HAL, "All these worlds are yours, except Europa"

the monolith was supposed to be found on our moon first though! ;) as for Europa.... just have to wait till 2015 for the launch of JIMO (Jupiter Icy Moon Orbiter) which is going to do extensive studies of Callisto, then Ganymede & finally Europa... mainly searching for subterranean oceans.

the monolith was supposed to be found on our moon first though!

Ever wondered why we never went back dude?..it's there man trust me.

:P hhehe

We never went back becuase its a big boring cold rock.

Sounds like something the jimny would jump at the chance to visit...

We've been to the moon heaps of times... just that people stopped caring after the first time.

what's this 'we' bizniz? ;p there are a couple of new lunar expiditions in the nasa pipeline... unmanned ones though afaik. the smart-1 euro probe is currently doing a global surface survey in various spectrums & is searching the moon's south pole for mountains of eternal sunlight which would be perfect for a solar powered moonbase. & sif the moon is boring.. look at the luverly colours!
http://dem0n.qgl.org/images/temp/mooncolourd.jpg

;P

last edited by demon at 13:30:08 23/Feb/06

this is all awesome, props demon

yeh props Demon, I too luv the space stuff.
GG

i am also proping Demon

looks like theres water on it

yar... it's for the whalers on moon who carry the harpoons.

You space dudes should read the first few chapters of:

A Short History of Nearly Everything - Bill Bryson

Amazing stuff.

Like if you were to draw our solar system to scale and you made the earth the size of a pea, pluto would be 2.5km away.

The shear size of space is staggering.

The shear size of space is staggering.

That's why they call it space.

I love that book Mission, imo its the type of text that should be used in schools. So easy to read yet interesting and well structured. Im a big fan of all his other stuff too :)

"Space is big, really big " - Douglas Adams.

:P

hehe Psycho! ;] that quote is deserving of the full deal!

"Space," it says, "is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly hugely mindboggingly big it is. I mean you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space. Listen ..." and so on.

but i totally agree with mission's sentiment about how big you perceive space to be in your mind compared to the real scale of space! which calls for another great Douglas Adams quote...

The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination.

one of the things that really highlighted this for me was using some solar system simulator software (celestia) & just checking out the scale of things. like hovering above the earth's north pole & zooming out till you see the moon come into view... it's a lot further away than it looks :P~ or zoom out to pluto & look back at the sun... it just looks like a big star.

http://dem0n.qgl.org/images/spacepix/earthmoon.png

http://dem0n.qgl.org/images/spacepix/plutocharon.png

& thanks for the props guys :D good to see i'm not the only astronomy nut around here :D

i also would like to extend "props" to you sir

nbsdfndggnmfk

Can you attack planets in that solar system thing?

last edited by fpot at 16:12:27 25/Feb/06