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The buildup of nitrogen is due to Pluto's vast distance from the Sun. At the equator, temperatures can drop to −240 °C (−400.0 °F; 33.1 K), causing nitrogen to freeze as water would freeze on Earth. The same polar wandering effect seen on Pluto would be observed on Earth were the Antarctic ice sheet several times larger. [101]
The average distance between Charon and Pluto is 19,570 kilometres (12,160 mi). ... that is gradually moving the Moon away from Earth takes it far enough away that ...
The lunar distance is on average approximately 385,000 km (239,000 mi), or 1.28 light-seconds; this is roughly 30 times Earth's diameter or 9.5 times Earth's circumference. Around 389 lunar distances make up an AU astronomical unit (roughly the distance from Earth to the Sun). Lunar distance is commonly used to express the distance to near ...
Additionally, astronomers have found 6 white dwarfs (stars that have exhausted all fusible hydrogen), 21 brown dwarfs, as well as 1 sub-brown dwarf, WISE 0855−0714 (possibly a rogue planet). The closest system is Alpha Centauri, with Proxima Centauri as the closest star in that system, at 4.2465 light-years from Earth.
Moons of Pluto. The dwarf planet Pluto has five natural satellites. [1] In order of distance from Pluto, they are Charon, Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra. [2] Charon, the largest, is mutually tidally locked with Pluto, and is massive enough that Pluto and Charon are sometimes considered a binary dwarf planet.
One particularly distant body is 90377 Sedna, which was discovered in November 2003.It has an extremely eccentric orbit that takes it to an aphelion of 937 AU. [2] It takes over 10,000 years to orbit, and during the next 50 years it will slowly move closer to the Sun as it comes to perihelion at a distance of 76 AU from the Sun. [3] Sedna is the largest known sednoid, a class of objects that ...
List of nearest galaxies. This is a list of known galaxies within 3.8 megaparsecs (12.4 million light-years) of the Solar System, in ascending order of heliocentric distance, or the distance to the Sun. This encompasses about 50 major Local Group galaxies, and some that are members of neighboring galaxy groups, the M81 Group and the Centaurus A ...
Tidal locking results in the Moon rotating about its axis in about the same time it takes to orbit Earth. Except for libration, this results in the Moon keeping the same face turned toward Earth, as seen in the left figure. If the Moon were not rotating at all, it would alternately show its near and far sides to Earth, while moving around Earth ...