The story behind Pluto's huge moon bodes well for distant ocean worlds
Since New Horizons' close encounter with Pluto 10 years ago, experts have come to think of the dwarf planet as much more scientifically valuable. Rather than a cold, featureless ball on the fringes of the solar system, the spacecraft images revealed a geologically diverse world, with mountains, ice sheets, pits, cliffs, cracks, and valleys.
Sealed With a Kiss: The Unexpected Origin Story of Pluto and Its Moon Charon
Pluto and Charon may have formed through a “kiss and capture” mechanism, with the two icy bodies colliding and becoming temporarily stuck together, spinning in a cosmic dance before separating into two objects that are forever bound in orbit,
Pluto May Have Captured Its Biggest Moon After an Ancient Dance and Kiss
Charon is large in size relative to Pluto, and is locked in a tight orbit with the dwarf planet. A new simulation suggests how it ended up there.
Pluto May Have Won Its Moon Charon with a ‘Kiss’
Pluto and its largest moon Charon could have come together via a 10-hour “kiss-and-capture” encounter after a grazing collision
Astronomers have for decades tried to figure out how Pluto captured its largest moon. Now, there’s a new theory
Pluto likely acquired large moon Charon in a “kiss and capture” collision billions of years ago. It may have created a subsurface ocean on the icy dwarf planet.
A Novel 'Kiss and Capture' Event Gave Pluto Its Largest Moon, Charon, New Study Suggests
The “demoted” dwarf planet Pluto and its largest moon Charon make an unusual pair, and for decades, scientists have been discussing how the binary system—in which each mutually orbits the other—came to be.
Scientists stunned after learning Pluto and its biggest moon collided billions of years ago: ‘Raises a lot of interesting questions’
They needed some space. New research suggests Pluto may have had a “kiss” with its largest moon billions of years ago in a harmless collision. The report, published in “Nature ...
Astronomy on MSN2d
Does Planet Nine exist?
The newcomer replacing Pluto presently goes by “Planet Nine.” If and when it finally shows up, it will get the honor of a ...
New telescope could finally prove there is an elusive 'Planet X' in our solar system
There are eight official planets (sorry, Pluto) in our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and ...
On This Day: Scientists discover dwarf planet Eris
Eris was discovered. It was considered the largest known dwarf planet in the solar system until a year later when Pluto was ...
Pluto’s Weirdly Big Moon May Have Come From A ‘Kiss And Capture’
Pluto's big moon Charon may have a different origin story than scientists suspected. New research suggests the two bodies ...
'Not Mars, not Jupiter': NASA finds frozen oceans in a small planet that could rewrite solar history
NASA reveals Ceres, a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, with frozen oceans and signs of ancient hydrothermal activity, ...