Astronomers marvel at the new discovery about Pluto

Not the planet, not comets like the long-standing statements about Pluto. Data analysis from New Horizons spacecraft revealed a very different reality .

Pluto has been demoted from the planet to "asteroids" or "dwarf planets" 10 years ago due to an unusually flat elliptical trajectory that makes Pluto not eligible to become a planet in the solar system. However, this star is still an interesting unknown that motivates scientists to learn every day.

Pluto always has a strong foothold in the minds of many people and they always think that the solar system still has 9 planets. But because it is too far from the Sun, Pluto is one of the coldest places in the solar system, with surface temperatures always kept at -225 degrees Celsius. Its surface is covered regularly by nitrogen ice. .

Panoramic picture of Pluto.(Photo: NASA / JHUAPL / SwRI).

The latest example of Pluto's incredible thing comes from analyzing data sent from the New Horizons spacecraft. The data showed the interaction between Pluto and the solar wind in the solar system. Astronomer David J. McComas from Princeton University must say: "This is the kind of interaction we have never seen anywhere in the Solar System so far. The results are amazing." .

This type of interaction has not only been witnessed by astronomers before but it has also been described more by a Mercury-like or Venus-like planet than a dwarf planet or a comet. Astronomers are also not ready for this.

Every second of the day, the Sun spews plasma currents that carry high charged particles moving in the Solar System at a rate of 160 million km / h. The way these particles interact with the atmosphere around planets, dwarf planets, moons and comets can tell us a lot about the composition that makes up the atmosphere around cosmic bodies. as well as the gravity they can maintain.

The most obvious example can be seen when the solar wind approaches a comet, they will be gentle and slow when far away, even the extremely subtle effects of the comet's gravity charged particles are only recorded when they are very close to this star. But when the solar wind interacts with a planet like Mars, the planet's gravity exerts a strong influence on solar particles very soon before they reach its atmosphere.

Having more features of a dwarf planet or a comet than a real planet, scientists also believe that the gravitational attraction of Pluto also has very small effects on the solar wind, but a series of data analysis from New Horizons spacecraft revealed a very different reality.

When solar particles approach Pluto, they are strongly influenced by the star's gravitational pull, however, only with short distances close to its icy surface, similar to a throne. comet. Speaking to Tech Times, James Maynard said: "The dwarf planet was found to interact only with the solar wind with a distance of 2,967 km, which is also the distance between Chicago and Los Angeles."

The gravitational attraction of Pluto also causes very small effects on the solar wind.

Therefore, basically, the Pluto is a hybrid between a dwarf planet, a comet and a planet . And now, no one can say for sure what it is.

"This is a form of intermediate interaction , a completely new form. It is not like comet, and it is not like the planet, it is in the middle of these two forms. We have visited 9 typical planets and tested. Investigating the solar wind interactions on these planets, and actually we have never seen anything similar, " McComas said.

These results are published in the Journal of Geophysical Research - Space Physics, a journal of the American Geophysical Society (AGU) and showed how truly special Pluto is. Whether Pluto is a planet or not, what it possesses is worth the debate.

The main research investigator of the New Horizons spacecraft also said: "These results show the power of exploratory exploration, once again we set foot in new discovery sites and found myself discovering completely new manifestations in nature Many people are always surprised by Pluto's complex geological and atmospheric structure and this study brings even more surprises, including the interaction between the solar wind and the atmosphere of this dwarf act. "