The telescopic camera on the New Horizons spacecraft took this high-resolution image of an intricate pattern of pits.

“Similar complementary capabilities of SOFIA in tandem with other ground-based and space-based astronomical observatories have been demonstrated and will continue to be explored in future,” said Margaret Meixner, USRA’s Director of SOFIA Mission Operations. The New Horizons mission flew past Pluto in 2015, after a nine-year journey from Earth. You’ll be driving along these methane ice ridges for hours, but here, you appreciate the way these sinister ridges rise hundreds to thousands of feet from the surface like sharp, jagged knives.


A proposed Pluto orbiter, seen here flying above the canyon system that dominates the planet's large moon, Charon, could explore the Pluto system for at least two years. You take off south, through vast, dusty expanse—among the flattest of Pluto’s upland regions. Consumer expectations for multiple screens containing real-time and reactive data, present a new challenge for remote marketing and production teams. SOFIA’s observations discovered that the particles are extremely small, just 0.06-0.10 micron thick, or 1,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair. It was the first Kuiper belt object to be discovered. “The problem is, it’s a huge element in appreciating the drama,” he said. … I took a sip of it, and I covered it up with my hand, because I had no idea,” Anvar said.

But if not, then spacefliers have to strap in, engage magnetic boots to keep their feet on the ground, or deal with the challenges of zero-G. “The Expanse” relies on Hollywood tricks like wire harnesses, blue-screen backgrounds and some serious special effects to show how astronauts tumble in zero-G. “The wire work really hurt my junk,” one of the show’s stars, Cas Anvar, complained. View our Privacy Policy. We studied what kind of payload should be flown on such an orbiter, what kind of orbital tour would be possible, what the main orbiter spacecraft attributes need to be, and how to get such a spacecraft from Earth to Pluto.

It’s analogous to the old trick of putting a glass up against the wall to hear what’s going on in the next room. Last minute predictions of exactly where the shadow would fall changed at the last minute. Bible verses about Pluto. But there’s one space reality that the producers have thrown out the air lock. She has composed numerous tracks in many genres, from

That weight is nearly five times more than New Horizons, but that’s the nature of an orbiter mission because it must carry so much fuel to brake into Pluto orbit.

Though the ground remains the bright beige you saw on the other side of the vast Planitia, this region is a highland, craggy and pitted, and the route snakes around frozen nitrogen ponds several miles across. These natural-color images result from refined calibration of data gathered by New Horizons' color Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC).

These cracks would in turn fill with the nitrogen ice, causing the water ice to pile up like a giant log jam and eventually become Pluto’s enormous ice mountains. That’s thanks to the Epstein drive, an invention that involves fusion power, magnetic coil exhaust acceleration and a lot of hand-waving. This site is maintained by the Planetary Science Communications team at, NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute/Alex Parker, Dawn Spacecraft in Thermal Vacuum Chamber, Titan's North: The Big Picture -- Annotated, 'Echo Mapping' in Faraway Galaxies Could Measure Vast Cosmic Distances, AI Is Helping Scientists Discover Fresh Craters on Mars, NASA Looks to Develop 3D Printing Construction Systems for Moon and Mars, October 2020: The Next Full Moon is the Harvest Moon, NASA's New Mars Rover Is Ready for Space Lasers. When New Horizons was 11,000 miles (18,000 km) past Pluto, it took this wide-angle image that shows the deep haze layers of the planet’s atmosphere.

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Dr. Lori Glaze The striking features on Pluto are clearly visible, including the bright expanse of Pluto's icy, nitrogen-and-methane rich "heart," Sputnik Planitia. Just 15 minutes after its closest approach to Pluto, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft looked back toward the planet and captured this near-sunset view of its rugged, icy mountains and flat ice plains. Scientists have only a rough idea of the... One of InSight's 7-foot (2.2 meter) wide solar panels seen from the lander's Instrument Deployment Camera. You could argue that one of the big reasons why the show is surviving its near-death experience on the Syfy channel, and going on to a fourth season with Amazon Studios, is because the production values impressed Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, a huge science-fiction fan. The Expanse by Zaina Arekat, releases 30 October 2020 1. This image of Justina AV-L-29, from the atlas of the giant asteroid Vesta, was created from images taken as NASA's Dawn mission flew around the object, also known as a protoplanet.

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This drops you off near the dwarf planet’s north pole, located inside a massive canyon system, everything covered by a thin veneer of deposited methane ice. We do not sell, rent or trade our email lists.

This is the highest-resolution color shot of Pluto’s receding crescent, taken when New Horizons was 120,000 miles (200,000 km) past the planet. Pluto’s atmosphere is predominantly nitrogen gas, along with small amounts of methane and carbon monoxide. Though the Sun is low in the sky at this lower latitude, and its light offers barely a glow, it still slightly illuminates the far side and bottom of the deep pit. For many, the most spectacular image from the incredible high-speed New Horizons flyby of Pluto in July 2015 was this one (above) of the layers of blue haze in the dwarf planet’s atmosphere. The images form a strip 50 miles (80 km) wide, trending from the northwest of Sputnik Planitia, across the Al-Idrisi Mountains, onto the shoreline of Pluto’s “heart” feature, and just into its icy plains.

Maybe you thought my previous post on the crushing g-force of the Epstein drive from The Expanse would be the end of that. What Would It Be Like to Take a Road Trip Across Pluto? “It may be more resilient than we thought.”. The eerie ride eventually deposits you at Virgil Fossae, a giant canyon that cuts through the Macula, extending as far as the eye can see. “There’s still a lot we don’t understand, but we’re forced now to reconsider earlier predictions,” said Person. If you like Zaina Arekat, you may also like: A post-metal "supergroup" that's more than the sum of its parts. If a ship is accelerating at a rate of 1 G, no problem. There are many reasons.

Other twists, however, hew more closely to the laws of physics. A transitional region in Saturn's atmosphere features long, linear cloud shapes, flanked to the north and south by more turbulent swirls.

Pre-order of The Expanse. Learn more about underwritten and sponsored content on GeekWire. One of Pluto’s most identifiable features, Cthulhu (pronounced kuh-THU-lu) stretches nearly halfway around Pluto’s equator, starting from the west of the great nitrogen ice plains known as Sputnik Planum. The blue and green that fill the center of the map represent different textures, from cellular terrain in the center and north to smooth, pitted plains in the south. Subscribe to GeekWire's Space & Science weekly newsletter. Zaina was diagnosed with Nemaline Myopathy at an early age in her childhood, but she found refuge in art and music to keep her inspired. Get 65% off observing tips, science news, & more with your Astronomy subscription. These particles are generated when ultraviolet radiation from the Sun interacts with methane and nitrogen in Pluto’s atmosphere. The Cassini spacecraft eyes a prominent crater on the moon Janus. NASA's SOFIA "flying telescope" on a Boeing 747SP prepares for take-off. The image was taken from a distance of 11,000 miles (18,000 kilometers) to Pluto; the scene is 230 miles (380 kilometers) across.