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Astronomy Picture of the Day - Charon: Moon of Pluto
NASA ^ | 3 Jun, 2023 | Image Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ./APL, Southwest Research Institute, U.S. Naval Observatory

Posted on 06/03/2023 11:47:50 AM PDT by MtnClimber

Explanation: A darkened and mysterious north polar region known to some as Mordor Macula caps this premier high-resolution view. The portrait of Charon, Pluto's largest moon, was captured by New Horizons near the spacecraft's closest approach on July 14, 2015. The combined blue, red, and infrared data was processed to enhance colors and follow variations in Charon's surface properties with a resolution of about 2.9 kilometers (1.8 miles). A stunning image of Charon's Pluto-facing hemisphere, it also features a clear view of an apparently moon-girdling belt of fractures and canyons that seems to separate smooth southern plains from varied northern terrain. Charon is 1,214 kilometers (754 miles) across. That's about 1/10th the size of planet Earth but a whopping 1/2 the diameter of Pluto itself, and makes it the largest satellite relative to its parent body in the Solar System. Still, the moon appears as a small bump at about the 1 o'clock position on Pluto's disk in the grainy, negative,telescopic picture inset at upper left. That view was used by James Christy and Robert Harrington at the U.S. Naval Observatory in Flagstaff to discover Charon in June of 1978.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Astronomy Picture of the Day; Science
KEYWORDS: nasa
To be added or removed from the Astronomy Picture of the Day ping list please send me a request via "Private Reply" (Mail).

For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.

1 posted on 06/03/2023 11:47:50 AM PDT by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber

2 posted on 06/03/2023 11:48:24 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: 21stCenturion; 21twelve; 4everontheRight; abb; AFB-XYZ; AFPhys; Agatsu77; America_Right; ...
Pinging the APOD list.

🪐 🌟 🌌 🍔


3 posted on 06/03/2023 11:49:26 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber
That's about 1/10th the size of planet Earth

I disagree with this statement. "(754 miles) across" is about 1/10th the diameter of Earth. It is about 224 million cubic miles in volume while Earth is about 268 trillion cubic miles in volume (volume = 4/3 X Pi X radius^3). Earth has about 1,000 times the volume of this moon and is likely over 1,000 times the mass.

4 posted on 06/03/2023 12:06:02 PM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

What an amazing photo! Charon appears to have had a violent past. You can see what looks like worn gulches interrupted by craters that have cones of deeper material rising from their centers.


5 posted on 06/03/2023 12:10:31 PM PDT by BradyLS (DO NOT FEED THE BEARS!)
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To: BradyLS

And it was only discovered in 1978.


6 posted on 06/03/2023 12:14:41 PM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

Star Wars was already in the (recent) past before Charon was discovered!


7 posted on 06/03/2023 12:16:27 PM PDT by BradyLS (DO NOT FEED THE BEARS!)
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To: BradyLS

That’s no moon...


8 posted on 06/03/2023 12:26:04 PM PDT by null and void (I’m starting to get the feeling that everything will kill covid except the vax.)
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To: MtnClimber

Wow 😯.


9 posted on 06/03/2023 12:33:33 PM PDT by No name given (Anonymous is who you’ll know me as)
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To: MtnClimber
So that's what happened to Mordor. Can the Eye take control of Biden's brain from there?


10 posted on 06/03/2023 1:06:55 PM PDT by DannyTN
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To: MtnClimber

Some aliens did a messy oil change?


11 posted on 06/03/2023 1:07:15 PM PDT by doorgunner69 (Let's go Brandon)
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To: MtnClimber

It has moons.

It has enough gravity to be ROUND.

So why has Pluto been demoted from “Planet”?

I don’t care, it will always be a Planet to me.


12 posted on 06/03/2023 4:58:45 PM PDT by left that other site (Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.)
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To: MtnClimber

Meanwhile here on earth we only get blurry photos of UFO’s and Bigfoot.


13 posted on 06/03/2023 9:24:53 PM PDT by minnesota_bound (Need more money to buy everything now)
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To: left that other site

Clyde Tombaugh was still alive when Charon was discovered. I heard him speak about 60 years after his discovery of Pluto—he was still going strong and very enthusiastic about astronomy. Discovering the ninth planet was not his only contribution.


14 posted on 06/05/2023 1:52:20 PM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: Verginius Rufus

Thanks! :-)


15 posted on 06/05/2023 1:58:39 PM PDT by left that other site (Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.)
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