Pluto Has a Nitrogen Heartbeat
By Theresa Machemer/Smithsonianmag.com
Pluto has a heartbeat of sorts, according to a new study from NASA’s New Horizons team.
Each day, sunlight hits the Sputnik Planitia basin—the left side of the heart—and nitrogen ice vaporizes. At night, Pluto’s temperature drops, and the vaporized nitrogen condenses back to ice. The cycle repeats every Plutonian day, which is about six and a half Earth days long, and powers the winds that shaped the dwarf planet’s landscape, per the study published on February 4 in the Journal of Geophysical Research.
“Before New Horizons, everyone thought Pluto was going to be a netball—completely flat, almost no diversity,” NASA astrophysicist and planetary scientist Tanguy Bertrand say in a statement. “But it’s completely different. It has a lot of different landscapes and we are trying to understand what’s going on there.”
Humanity got its best look at Pluto in 2015 when NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft sent back images of craters, glaciers, plains, and dunes. The photographs showed Pluto’s landscape surrounded by the thin haze of its mostly-nitrogen atmosphere.
The smooth features of Sputnik Planitia’s 2-mile-deep basin caught planetary scientists’ eyes that July.
Carol graduated from Riverside White Cross School of Nursing in Columbus, Ohio and received her diploma as a registered nurse. She attended Bowling Green State University where she received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in History and Literature. She attended the University of Toledo, College of Nursing, and received a Master’s of Nursing Science Degree as an Educator.
She has traveled extensively, is a photographer, and writes on medical issues. Carol has three children RJ, Katherine, and Stephen – one daughter-in-law; Katie – two granddaughters; Isabella Marianna and Zoe Olivia – and one grandson, Alexander Paul. She also shares her life with her husband Gordon Duff, many cats, and two rescues.
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No stars….
The freezing point of nitrogen is -346 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s cold!
…good point…absolute zero is minus like 459…most of outer space is a few degrees above that…i have always wondered how materials and mechanical systems were engineered to work in those temperatures….why should we care what the hell is going on on Pluto….waste of time and resources…knowing what is going on up there on Pluto is not going to save us….assuming it is all not made up…
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