This artist's illustration shows the scale and comparative brightness of Pluto's small satellites, as discovered by the Hubble Space Telescope over the past several years. Pluto's binary companion, Charon (discovered in 1978), is placed at the bottom for scale. Two of the moons are highly oblate. The reflectivity among the moons varies from dark charcoal to the brightness of white sand. Hubble cannot resolve surface features on the moons and so the cratered textures seen here are purely for illustration purposes.
Credits
NASA, ESA, M. Showalter (SETI Institute), and A. Feild (STScI)| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Nix, Hydra, Kerberos, Styx, Charon |
| Object Description | Minor Moons of the Pluto-Charon System |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | Data of the minor moons of Pluto were obtained from various HST proposals, including : M. Showalter (SETI Institute) and D. Hamilton (University of Maryland, College Park), who also comprise the science team for this release. Object Name: Styx Discovery Year: 2012 Semi-major axis (in km): 42,700 Period (in days): 20.2 Object Name: Nix Discovery Year: 2005 Semi-major axis (in km): 48,700 Period (in days): 24.9 Object Name: Kerberos Discovery Year: 2011 Semi-major axis (in km): 57,800 Period (in days): 32.2 Object Name: Hydra Discovery Year: 2005 Semi-major axis (in km): 64,800 Period (in days): 38.2 |
| Instrument | WFC3/UVIS |
| Exposure Dates | April 27, 2013 |
| Filters | F606W (V) |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
