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A dwarf planet is a small planetary-mass object that is in direct orbit around the Sun, massive enough to be gravitationally rounded, but insufficient to achieve orbital dominance like the eight classical planets of the Solar System.
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.
The remaining objects of the Solar System (including the four terrestrial planets, the dwarf planets, moons, asteroids, and comets) together comprise less than 0.002% of the Solar System's total mass. [h] The Sun is composed of roughly 98% hydrogen and helium, [41] as are Jupiter and Saturn.
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 ...
Used to distinguish between a planet and a dwarf planet. ^ This object's rotation is synchronous with its orbital period, meaning that it only ever shows one face to its primary. ^ Objects' planetary discriminants based on their similar orbits to Eris. Sedna's population is currently too little-known for a planetary discriminant to be determined.
The Sun, planets, moons and dwarf planets (true color, size to scale, distances not to scale) The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the Solar System: Solar System – gravitationally bound system comprising the Sun and the objects that orbit it, either directly or indirectly. Of those objects that orbit the ...
Eris is a trans-Neptunian dwarf planet. Its orbital characteristics more specifically categorize it as a scattered-disk object (SDO), or a TNO that has been "scattered" from the Kuiper belt into more-distant and unusual orbits following gravitational interactions with Neptune as the Solar System was forming. Although its high orbital ...
The dwarf planet systems Pluto–Charon and Eris–Dysnomia are the only known examples of mutual tidal locking in the Solar System, [20] though it is likely that Orcus–Vanth is another. [21] The reddish-brown cap of the north pole of Charon is composed of tholins, organic macromolecules that may be essential ingredients of life.