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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.
[a] Originally considered a planet, Pluto's status as part of the Kuiper belt caused it to be reclassified as a dwarf planet in 2006. It is compositionally similar to many other objects of the Kuiper belt, and its orbital period is characteristic of a class of KBOs, known as " plutinos ," that share the same 2:3 resonance with Neptune.
Pluto is grey, Orcus is red, and Neptune is the white (stationary) dot at 5 o'clock. Uranus is blue, Saturn yellow, and Jupiter red. Orbits and sizes of the larger plutinos (and the reference non-plutino 2002 KX 14 ).
Pluto was considered a planet up until 2006, when researchers at the International Astronomical Union voted to "demote" it to dwarf planet.
NASA has released the 'first and best' images the New Horizons spacecraft was able to take of Pluto during its flyby of the dwarf planet in July. Skip to main content. Sign in. Mail. 24/7 Help ...
For 76 years, Pluto was considered out solar system's ninth planet. So what caused it to lose its planetary status? Find out on this episode of "Space, Down to Earth"!
For instance, for a large portion of names ending in -s, the oblique stem and therefore the English adjective changes the -s to a -d, -t, or -r, as in Mars–Martian, Pallas–Palladian and Ceres–Cererian; [note 1] occasionally an -n has been lost historically from the nominative form, and reappears in the oblique and therefore in the English ...
Also located on the Mars Hill campus is the 33-centimeter (13-inch) Pluto Discovery Telescope, used by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930 to discover the dwarf planet Pluto. In 2014, the 8,000 square feet (740 m 2 ) Putnam Center was opened. [ 10 ]