The Pluto science community is rich and diverse, just like its target of study: the ever-fascinating Pluto and its satellite moons.
This blog entry concludes my series of talk summaries for the July 22-26, 2013 Pluto Science Conference, “The Pluto System on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons: Perspectives and Predictions.” You can read more about the conference and browse through the abstracts at the conference website https://dnnpro.outer.jhuapl.edu/plutoscience/Home.aspx In his closing Read full post
Pluto Exotica. Atoms. Pick Up Ions. Bow Shocks. Suprathermal Tails. X-Rays. UV airglow.
The morning of the last day of this week’s July 22-26, 2013, Pluto Science Conference opened up the discussion with outer atmosphere (far out) and magnetosphere (really far out) talks. Fran Bagenal (University of Colorado) started the session with a talk on “The Solar Wind Interaction with Pluto’s Escaping Atmosphere.” Pluto’s Read full post
Winds. Fog. Frost. Global Weather Predictions on Pluto.
Talk summaries from the Pluto Science Conference held July 22-26, 2013 in Laurel, MD continues. This blog entry is about atmosphere presentations on July 26th. Angela Zalucha (SETI) began the discussion with her talk entitled “Predictions of Pluto’s vertical temperature and wind structure from the MIT Pluto general circulation model.” A general Read full post
ISS Daily Summary Report - 07/26/13
New Status: Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Mobility Unit (EMU) Troubleshooting: Flight Engineer (FE)-3 Cassidy and FE-6 Nyberg performed a series of EMU troubleshooting steps on EMU 3011 to investigate the likely causes of the water issue experienced by FE-5 Parmitano during EVA 23. This troubleshooting investigated the functionality of the fan, pump, Read full post
Coordinate systems do matter. Brush up on that Right Hand Rule, y’all.
In an engaging talk by Amanda Zangari (SwRI) entitled “Plutography: A Meta-Analysis of Coordinates on Pluto From Charon’s Discovery to the Present Day,” she compared and contrasted two coordinate systems used by Pluto researchers. Her motivation is that data sets, past, present and future will be compared to the New Read full post
Did you know it’s northern springtime on Pluto right now? Pluto is far from a cold lump of rock we were told about in school. It’s a dynamic world and has seasons.
The afternoon session of Jul 25th started with John Stansberry (STScI) talk entitled “Interactions between Pluto’s Surface and Atmosphere.” He stated, “The similarities between Pluto and Triton are remarkable.” Main properties between Triton and Pluto Pluto has a volatile-rich atmosphere (N2, CO, CH4) and interacts with the surface bring about mass and Read full post
Today: Geology of unmapped worlds. 2015: Pluto will never be the same as New Horizons brings you a Pluto, Charon, Nix, Hydra, Kerberos, and Styx, in ways never seen before.
This a blog entry for a series about the Pluto Science Conference being held at JHU’s APL in Laurel, MD, Jul 22-26, 2013. This entry summaries surface geology talks presented on Jul 25th. Paul Schenk (LPI) began the session with his talk entitled “The Improbable Art of Predicting Pluto-Charon Geology.” Thanks Read full post
It’s more than skin deep. Interiors of Pluto and Charon, a Discussion.
This entry is a summary of talks presented at the Interiors session Jul 24th, 2013, during the Pluto Science Conference in Laurel, MD being held this week Jul 22-26, 2013. Christophe Sotin (JPL) “Processes involved in the evolution of Pluto’s interior Structure.” He started his talk with a comparison of model Read full post
Some insights into Charon and what roles laboratory work play in New Horizons science.
These are talk summaries from the afternoon of Jul 24th at the Pluto Science Conference being held this week, Jul 22-26, 2013 at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, MD. Marc Buie (SwRI) walked us through “The Surface of Charon.” Charon was detected by Jim Christy in April Read full post
ISS Daily Summary Report - 7/25/13
New Status: 50 Progress (50P) Undocking: The Progress 50P vehicle (M-18M, No. 418) successfully undocked from the ISS Russian Segment Docking Compartment 1 (DC1) nadir docking port at 3:44 pm CDT, after the command to open the vehicle hooks was issued at 3:41 pm CDT. The separation appeared smooth with no Read full post
