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NASA's Horizons Spacecraft To Probe Pluto Moon For Underground Ocean

Posted by samzenpus on from the finding-water dept.

An anonymous reader writes NASA's New Horizons spacecraft is moving towards Pluto to explore Charon, one of Pluto's moons. The aim of the mission is to search of evidence of an ancient underground ocean on the moon. "Our model predicts different fracture patterns on the surface of Charon depending on the thickness of its surface ice, the structure of the moon's interior and how easily it deforms, and how its orbit evolved," said Alyssa Rhoden of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "By comparing the actual New Horizons observations of Charon to the various predictions, we can see what fits best and discover if Charon could have had a subsurface ocean in its past, driven by high eccentricity."

12 of 47 comments (clear)

  1. Ocean of what by rossdee · · Score: 4, Informative

    Here on Earth we think of Oceans of water, but way out at Pluto's orbit it could be something esle (ammonia, methane, hydrogen, nitrogen...

    1. Re:Ocean of what by dbIII · · Score: 5, Funny

      Either way it oort to be interesting.

    2. Re:Ocean of what by Charliemopps · · Score: 2

      Here on Earth we think of Oceans of water, but way out at Pluto's orbit it could be something esle (ammonia, methane, hydrogen, nitrogen...

      Given the makeup of the moon, they're looking for water. It's mostly water with some methane ices mixed in. Also, the article specifically mentions its a water ocean they're trying to prove existed.

    3. Re:Ocean of what by sconeu · · Score: 4, Funny

      Oh, just kuiper mouth shut if you're going to be critical!

      --
      General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
  2. quite a rapid flyby by peter303 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In order to get the probe there in the career lifetimes of the investigators and minimize decay of the power source and instruments, this probe has the fastest velocity of any probe so far. It took only eight hours to pass the Moon's orbit. That gives it about a three day window to make measurements before heading off into the Kuiper belt (and 2nd plutoid if they can find one soon).

    1. Re:quite a rapid flyby by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 3, Funny

      In order to get the probe there in the career lifetimes of the investigators and minimize decay of the power source and instruments, this probe has the fastest velocity of any probe so far. It took only eight hours to pass the Moon's orbit. That gives it about a three day window to make measurements before heading off into the Kuiper belt (and 2nd plutoid if they can find one soon).

      I don't fully understand that unit of velocity - can you frame it in Kessel runs per parsec?

      --
      Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
    2. Re:quite a rapid flyby by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Correction: this probe has the fastest launch velocity of any probe so far.
      The Helios probes had the fastest velocity of any probe so far (because it was falling towards the Sun), and Voyager 1 has the fastest velocity right now (because of velocity boosts from Jupiter and Saturn).
      More info.

    3. Re:quite a rapid flyby by Tablizer · · Score: 2

      New Horizons did get a gravity boost by passing near Jupiter, but Saturn wasn't in the vicinity like it was during Voyager's time. One of the motivations for the Voyager missions was to take advantage of the coincidental alignment of the 4 gas giants at the time so that probe(s) could visit one after the other (without large expensive boosters).

      Voyager 1 didn't attempt Uranus and Neptune because it would mean sacrificing a close Titan pass. Thus, that was left to Voyager 2. Plus, there were concerns about Saturn's rings damaging a probe aimed Uranus's way. But Pioneer 11 and Voyager 1 ring analysis made the mission planners more confident. (Pioneer 11 was truly a pioneer in that it scouted the area in preparation for bigger probes.)

      New Horizons is facing similar ring concerns, being that Pluto has enough moons to suggest a debris field or ring from prior collisions. They will probably fly through an orbit area that is in theory cleared out by Charon, but there are no guarantees. Since New Horizons mostly records first and sends later, because unlike Voyager it doesn't have independent instrument booms, if it's smashed by debris, we'll only have preliminary photos and analysis in pocket.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
  3. Re:Couple of things I don't get here by pjt33 · · Score: 2

    Having RTFA (I'm sorry), they think that it's probable that way back when Charon's orbit around Pluto was elliptical enough to generate tidal forces which would have warmed its interior. They don't know whether the cracks exist, and if they don't find any then it puts an upper bound on the historical eccentricity of the orbit.

  4. KSP by Thanshin · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Orbit each planet.
    Land a probe on each planet.
    Land a probe on each moon.
    Bring back samples from each location.
    Colonize.

    Until we do all those, we are cavemen with delusions of grandeur.

  5. Re:What an odd headline from The Register by starless · · Score: 2

    Or maybe they just like to capitalise any word that has a vaguely smutty alternative meaning.

    That's what they do.

    (I find it rather annoying, but less annoying than their global warming denial articles.)

  6. Re:Meanwhile... by MrLogic17 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There's plenty of water in Africa. You haven't actually been there, have you?
    I have. I've seen what what's there on the ground. There are endless well-drilling, housing, and food projects funded by the western world, and each one is a success. The problem is the local corruption and lack of rule of law. No matter how much established nations invest in the area, local corruption will un-do and destroy.

    If you have a proposal for how NASA can fix this problem, I'm all ears.