{"id":16019,"date":"2015-10-03T01:19:53","date_gmt":"2015-10-02T17:19:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/charon-takes-center-stage-in-new-batch-of-new-horizons-images\/"},"modified":"2015-10-03T01:19:53","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T17:19:53","slug":"charon-takes-center-stage-in-new-batch-of-new-horizons-images","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/charon-takes-center-stage-in-new-batch-of-new-horizons-images\/","title":{"rendered":"Charon takes center stage in new batch of New Horizons images"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"This
This enhanced color view of Charon comes from New Horizons\u2019 Ralph color camera. The colors highlight the subtle variations in the composition of Charon\u2019s crust, with the reddish region near the north pole \u2014 informally named Mordor Macular \u2014 standing out most prominently. Credit: NASA\/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory\/Southwest Research Institute<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With a meandering canyon system four times as long, and twice as deep, as the Grand Canyon in the American Southwest, the crust of Pluto\u2019s moon Charon may have been shaped by violent eruptions and complicated geology once thought improbable for such a small body in the far depths of the solar system, scientists said Thursday.<\/p>\n

Two-and-a-half months on from its historic first-ever encounter with Pluto on July 14, NASA\u2019s New Horizons spacecraft is beaming home bits of data and imagery a little at a time, its radio link with Earth strained by the probe\u2019s location 3.1 billion miles away.<\/p>\n

The latest pictures released Thursday illustrate Charon as a complex world covered in ridges, canyons, mountains and different colors, with a noticeable change in terrain between the moon\u2019s northern and southern hemispheres.<\/p>\n

Said Ross Beyer, an affiliate of the New Horizons geology team from the SETI Institute and NASA\u2019s Ames Research Center: \u201cWe thought the probability of seeing such interesting features on this satellite of a world at the far edge of our solar system was low, but I couldn\u2019t be more delighted with what we see!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sharper
Sharper than the view above, this image combines high-resolution imagery from New Horizons\u2019 telescopic LORRI black and white camera with color data from the Ralph instrument. Features as small as a half-mile (0.8 kilometers) are resolved here. Credit: NASA\/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory\/Southwest Research Institute<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Although Charon is relatively modest in size \u2014 just slightly bigger than Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt \u2014 it has more than half the diameter of its companion Pluto. The similar sizes make Pluto and Charon a binary planet, where they move around each other in a wobbly 6.4-day orbit centered on a point in space just outside Pluto.<\/p>\n

Many scientists expected Charon to be dull, gray and pockmarked with craters like the moon, but the story is changing.<\/p>\n

Images released Thursday by NASA are the best views yet of Charon \u2014 even sharper views are still to come \u2014 and show a network of canyons and crevasses just north of the moon\u2019s equator. Scientists say the chasms stretch more than 1,000 miles across the face of Charon observed by New Horizons during its July flyby, and apparently wraps around to the unseen far side of the frozen world.<\/p>\n

\u201cFour times as long as the Grand Canyon, and twice as deep in places, these faults and canyons indicate a titanic geological upheaval in Charon\u2019s past,\u201d NASA said in a press release.<\/p>\n

The New Horizons spacecraft downlinked the pictures showing the canyon system Sept. 21. The images were captured just before the probe\u2019s closest approach to Charon.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt looks like the entire crust of Charon has been split open,\u201d said John Spencer, deputy lead for the mission\u2019s geology, geophysics and imaging team at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado. \u201cIn respect to its size relative to Charon, this feature is much like the vast Valles Marineris canyon system on Mars.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"This
This composite image of Pluto and Charon with enhanced colors shows a direct comparison of the brightness and terrain types, highlighting the similarity between Charon\u2019s reddish north pole and red colors on Pluto. The separation between the two worlds is not to scale. Credit: NASA\/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory\/Southwest Research Institute<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Farther to the south, the rugged canyon lands give way to a smooth plain informally dubbed Vulcan Planum. Geologists say the region appears to be younger than the terrain to the north, a sign that something resurfaced that part of Charon more recently.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team is discussing the possibility that an internal water ocean could have frozen long ago, and the resulting volume change could have led to Charon cracking open, allowing water-based lavas to reach the surface at that time,\u201d said Paul Schenk, a New Horizons team member from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston.<\/p>\n

The eruptions could have spewed material across Charon\u2019s landscapes, refreezing to cover up ancient craters and other features now more prevalent in the northern hemisphere.<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This enhanced color view of Charon comes from New Horizons\u2019 Ralph color camera. The colors highlight the subtle variations in the composition of Charon\u2019s crust, with the reddish region near the north pole \u2014 informally named Mordor Macular \u2014 standing out most prominently. Credit: NASA\/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory\/Southwest Research Institute With a meandering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2172,2173,2174,1561],"class_list":["post-16019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-charon","tag-kuiper-belt","tag-new-horizons","tag-planetary-science"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16019"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16019\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}