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 ...
Smithsonian Magazine on MSN3d
A Novel ‘Kiss and Capture’ Event Gave Pluto Its Largest Moon, Charon, New Study Suggests
Researchers accounted for the previously overlooked structures of the dwarf planet and moon in computer simulations of a ...
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.
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 ...
“Kiss and Capture:” The Icy Collision That Bound Pluto and Charon Forever
Pluto and Charon's origin story has been rewritten by a recent study, revealing they formed from a unique "kiss and capture" ...
Astronomy on MSN5d
Pluto may have ‘kissed’ Charon to capture it
New models reveal Pluto and Charon may have spent some of their early history locked together in an embrace after a grazing ...
Knowridge4d
Here’s how Pluto and Charon became a bizarre double planet
For decades, astronomers suspected that Pluto and Charon formed through a process similar to Earth and the Moon. This theory, ...
Newly discovered 'kiss and capture' mechanism explains the formation of Pluto and its largest moon
Billions of years ago, in the frigid outer reaches of our solar system, two icy worlds collided. Rather than destroying each ...
Newsweek6d
Space: How Pluto Landed its Moon With a 'Kiss'
In the wake of this colossal impact, the colliding bodies behaved like fluids, with the moon forming out of the molten debris which had been ejected into space. "Pluto and Charon are different ...
'Kiss and capture': Scientists propose new explanation for Charon, Pluto's largest moon
Unlike Earth, where the Moon orbits the planet, Pluto and Charon orbit each other, forming a binary system that is more ...
As the US and China race to the moon, these loopholes in space law could cause conflict
Outer space is infinite, but that hasn't stopped humans trying to impose their laws on it. There are more ways for people to ...