That was quick: less than 24 hours after receiving the first batch of data from the New Horizons probe, NASA scientists have released the first truly close-up shot of Pluto’s surface to the public.
The photo shows off less than one per cent of the planet’s surface, but clearly visible are huge mountains that NASA says are over 3 300 metres high, most likely comprised of ice and bedrock and still “geologically active”, according to a report on Wired. That last bit has scientists a tad puzzled as planets are not expected to be geologically active when they’re not orbiting much larger bodies.
John Spencer, one of the lead scientists on the New Horizons project remarked that the other fascinating thing about the image is that it doesn’t show any impact craters – craters caused by collisions with meteorites or other space debris – a fact that says to NASA’s boffins that Pluto’s surface is relatively young.
“Relatively” in this case means those mountains formed less than 100 million years ago, a mere twinkle compared to the solar system’s age of 4.56 billion years.
No doubt more revelations are in store for the New Horizons team as they pore over the probe’s data that was gathered during its recent flyby of the dwarf planet. To read more about it, check out NASA’s Pluto page over here.
If this picture has you all excited for more Pluto news, you”re probably going to have have a really good Friday as more scans like this one are expected to be released.
[Source – Wired, Image – NASA]
