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Pluto is Much Colder Than Expected
IZ Reloaded writes "Any would be travellers to Pluto should bring extra winter gear. The new temperature on Pluto according to scientists is 43 degrees Kelvin. That's 10 degrees Kelvin colder than expected. From CNN: "Astronomers think Pluto's colder than expected temperature reading involves interactions between nitrogen ice on the planet's surface and the nitrogen gas that makes up its atmosphere...Pluto is a dynamic example of what we might call an anti-greenhouse effect...""
First time they used an oral thermometer, the second time a rectal one.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
The new temperature on Pluto according to scientists is 43 degrees Kelvin.
That's nothing, my ex girlfriend easily was the coldest object in our solar system. She had to be way colder than that.
Could I be the first to point out that it's just 10 Kelvin? no degrees here
= -382.27 degrees Fahrenheit
= -230.15 degrees Celsius
= really fucking cold outside.
it's just the sort of place you'd need to run a few Pentium Extreme Edition systems.
But seriously, while researchers try to find exotic materials that exhibit room-temperature superconductivity, you could take more common materials and run them at insanely fast speeds out there. Of course, it would take a while to upload your code and data and download any processing results.......
Maybe the dark side of Mercury would be more feasible.
-- *My* journal is more interesting than *yours*...
so it says that Charon, Pluto's moon, is warmer than the planet. Since Charon is almost as big as Pluto, I am sure this new tidbit will add more to the deabte concerning what relation the two celestial bodies have with each other and how they came to be paired.
I'm sure some newspaper will soon start running headlines about how Pluto is "23% colder than anticipated." In the real world, 10 K isn't that much, although it would be nice to know why our estimates are off. For reference, water freezes at 273.15 K, and the deepest darkest nook of outer space registers about 2.7 K, thanks to some background microwave radiation.
My P4 would fix that in about 10 mins.
Silence is golden... and duct tape is silver.
I don't understand why it would require so much more insulation. Isn't heat transfer proportional to the difference in temperature of each side? So if you wanted to maintain your equipment at 0c, that's 273K-43K = 230 vs 273K-53K= 220. The heat transfer of the material is a constant, so 230/220 = 1.045, so about 4.5% thicker insulation.
AccountKiller
It's not so much the cold as it is the humidity.
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
Batteries don't tend to work very well at all at 43K. Since batteries are chemical devices the chemical reactions happen MUCH slower (if at all) at such a low temperature.
I don't know the effects of cold on normal solid state electronics, but I wouldn't have a problem believing that some components aren't going to work normally at 43K. It's not as if the parts manufacturer tests them at these extreme temperatures.
AccountKiller
I just love the headline. Tourists dissappointed. Pluto falls short of vacationer's expectations.
Man on Pluto: "It's cold."
"It's not what we expected," said Mrs. White, mother of four, "We thought it'd be much milder than this. We haven't been able to go out all holiday and the kids have been bored. It was either this or Disney and the kids were all excited to get to see Pluto. We didn't think it'd be like this."
Mr. White says he intends to pursue compensation from NASA and other astronomic research organizations for misrepresenting Pluto in tourist information.
"It's flagrant false advertising," said Mr. White, father of three.
No. Pluto only has an atmosphere during its summer which it is currently in. (It is closer to the sun at 30AU than it will be again for a very long time) During the winter the atmosphere will give up it's heat and fall to the surface as solid nitrogen snow where it will sit for a couple hundred years until the sun once again turns it from solid to gas. But the surface will always stay at the same temperature. This is the same effect seen when you measure the temperature of water with ice cubes in it. The water will stay at 32 degrees until all the ice is gone even if you put a flame underneath. The added heat would merely make the ice melt faster rather than raise the water temperature.
Liberals call everyone Nazis yet they are the closest thing to it.
That is just one of the reasons you don't use batteries far from the sun. RTG's generate a constant source of heat and electricity for years due to radioactice decay. You could up the anti with a full scale nuclear reactor but nasa would be hard pressed to sneak that out of the gravity well. The only other option is to beam energy there but that is a problem becuase it's hard the amim the attena. Nuclear power is really the only way to go for deep space travle.
Microsoft has already launched a probe to harness the power of Pluto to cool the Xbox 360.
The White House, misreading the term "global warming", immediately denied that Pluto exists. After reading the article they retracted the statement and issued another, stating that they will investigate Pluto's "anti-warmification properties".
An investigation has been opened into just who Kelvin is, and why he's allowed to practice science without a degree.
My script don't crash! She crashes, you crashed her!
Well, from what I know the reason that RTG generators are used is because of the extremely low light levels so far from the sun, not cold. The Mars rovers for instance use solar panels with batteries and heaters. I'd bet batteries+solar panel+heaters is a LOT cheaper than an RTG.
But you're right, on a mission to pluto they'd have to use an RTG for power, so chemical batteries wouldn't be needed. I hadn't thought of the low light levels. But, the original point is that a heat source is important because electronics don't work the same at such extremely low temperatures.
AccountKiller
I mean, you'd be emotionally distant too if your master was never home, always away lobbying congress for copyright extensions.
I didn't really have Pluto on my "must visit" list anyway but with that announcement it's certainly never going to be on it.
Damn the Plutorians and their cold world.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
Good thing I saw as I was leaving on my vacation to Pluto; I hadn't packed any winter clothing. Thanks Slashdot!
One day two Girton girls are on his bus and one remarks his age and physique, turns to the other and murmurs "Super conductor". To which the other replies "Three degrees Kelvin."
As a result of the parent post, this joke is now officially demolished.
Pining for the fjords
That's an interesting point. From the article, Pluto receives about 1/1000th as much sunlight as the Earth. From here http://www.powerfromthesun.net/chapter1/Chapter1.h tm we see that the Earth receives 1367 watts per square meter, so we can assume that Pluto typically receives only 1.367 watts per square meter. Dumping the heat from a single P4EE into Pluto's surface could be pretty disruptive, hundreds of watts over a small surface area. The rush of nitrogen vapor would be like a bomb exploding.
-- *My* journal is more interesting than *yours*...
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