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It is the largest known trans-Neptunian object by volume, by a small margin, but is less massive than Eris. Like other Kuiper belt objects, Pluto is made primarily of ice and rock and is much smaller than the inner planets. Pluto has roughly one-sixth the mass of the Moon, and one-third its volume.
The largest of these may have a hydrostatic-equilibrium shape, but most are irregular. Most of the trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) listed with a radius smaller than 200 km have "assumed sizes based on a generic albedo of 0.09" since they are too far away to
The geography of Pluto refers to the study and mapping of physical features across the dwarf planet Pluto. On 14 July 2015, the New Horizons spacecraft became the first spacecraft to fly by Pluto. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] During its brief flyby, New Horizons made detailed geographical measurements and observations of Pluto and its moons .
The objects out there are also much smaller than Pluto. But Voyager 2 6 returned great data after Neptune, and our instruments are 30 to 40 years more technologically advanced than those. We estimate the spacecraft will have enough power to operate until about mid-2030s.
The number of dwarf planets in the Solar System is unknown. Estimates have run as high as 200 in the Kuiper belt [1] and over 10,000 in the region beyond. [2] However, consideration of the surprisingly low densities of many large trans-Neptunian objects, as well as spectroscopic analysis of their surfaces, suggests that the number of dwarf planets may be much lower, perhaps only nine among ...
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NASA has released a map of Pluto's surface made from images recently taken by the New Horizons probe and it includes some quite mysterious features. Particularly notable is the lightened area ...
This is smaller than the largest natural satellite that is known not to be gravitationally rounded, Neptune VIII Proteus (radius 210 ± 7 km). Several of these were once in equilibrium but are no longer: these include Earth's moon [ 77 ] and all of the moons listed for Saturn apart from Titan and Rhea. [ 55 ]