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Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Sun. It is the largest known trans-Neptunian object by volume, by a small margin, but is less massive than Eris.
Many TNOs are often just assumed to have Pluto's density of 2.0 g/cm 3, but it is just as likely that they have a comet-like density of only 0.5 g/cm 3. [ 4 ] For example, if a TNO is incorrectly assumed to have a mass of 3.59 × 10 20 kg based on a radius of 350 km with a density of 2 g/cm 3 but is later discovered to have a radius of only 175 ...
This can only occur at two points in Pluto's orbit; coincidentally, these points are near Pluto's perihelion and aphelion. Occultations occur when Pluto passes in front of and blocks one of Pluto's satellites. Charon has an angular diameter of 4 degrees of arc as seen from the surface of Pluto; the Sun appears much smaller, only 39 to 65 ...
The geology of Charon encompasses the characteristics of the surface, crust, and interior of Pluto's moon Charon. Like the geology of Pluto, almost nothing was known of Charon's geology until the New Horizons of the Pluto system on 14 July 2015. Charon's diameter is 1,208 km (751 mi)—just over half that of Pluto. [1]
The diameter of the core is hypothesized to be approximately 1700 km, 70% of Pluto's diameter. [28] It is possible that such heating continues today, creating a subsurface ocean layer of liquid water and ammonia some 100 to 180 km thick at the core–mantle boundary.
Eris's discovery contributed to a debate about the definition of a planet because it is 25% more massive than Pluto [219] and about the same diameter. It has one known moon, Dysnomia . Like Pluto, its orbit is highly eccentric, with a perihelion of 38.2 AU (roughly Pluto's distance from the Sun) and an aphelion of 97.6 AU, and steeply inclined ...
Dwarf planet Eris, similar in size to its better-known cosmic cousin Pluto, has remained an enigma since being discovered in 2005 lurking in the solar system's far reaches. While Pluto was ...
Examples are Ceres in the asteroid belt and Pluto in the Kuiper belt. [ 46 ] Dynamicists usually prefer using gravitational dominance as the threshold for planethood, because from their perspective smaller bodies are better grouped with their neighbours, e.g. Ceres as simply a large asteroid and Pluto as a large Kuiper belt object.