Pluto was discovered in 1930 and known as the ninth plant from the Sun until the year 2006. At which time Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet and added to the list of minor planets with the given number 134340.
Pluto’s rotation period is about 6.39 Earth days and takes 248 Earth years to orbit the Sun.
Pluto’s volume is about 0.6% that of Earth. It’s diameter is 2,306 km give or take 20 km, or roughly 66% that of the Moon. Pluto’s atmosphere makes if very hard to get the true size within a certain margin.
The thin atmosphere of Pluto is made up of nitrogen, methane, and carbon monoxide gases. Scientists have also come to believe, that Pluto’s atmosphere is very poisonous with a very high amount carbon monoxide. Which acts as a coolant. While the methane absorbs sunlight, which produces heating. This creates an anti-greenhouse effect. Due to this, scientists believe that the temperature is about -230 C, some 20 degrees cooler then previously believed.
There are three known natural satellites or moons. Charon is the largest of the three with a diameter of 1,205 km. Discovered in 1978 at the United States Naval Observatory Flagstaff. Followed by Hydra, known as the outer most moon of Pluto. It was discovered in 2005 by the Hubble Space Telescope, it’s diameter is 114 km. Nix was also discovered at the same time as Hydra, being the smallest of the three it’s diameter is only 91 km.
Due to Pluto’s more of an oval than a circular orbit around the Sun it distance ranges from 4,436,824,613 km to 7,375,927,931 km. It takes 328 minutes for the light of the Sun to reach Pluto, so that makes Pluto 328 light minutes from the Sun. In comparison it take just over 8 minutes for the Suns light to reach the Earth.
It would take about 23.3 year to travel to Pluto from Earth. Back in January of 2006 NASA launched a probe called New Horizons to fly by Pluto. Being one of the fastest man made objects it is still going to take it about 9.5 years to travel from the Earth to Pluto.
New Horizons will contain seven interments that are designed to gather data as well as map and scan Pluto and the neighboring Kuiper Belt. One of the instruments on board is Ralph it is a four color mapping camera designed to map the surface and temperature of Pluto. Alice is another interment fitted on New Horizons. It is an ultraviolet spectrometer, it will study the composition of Pluto’s upper atmosphere. There is also LORRI, the “Long Range Reconnaissance Imager.” It is a high resolution camera that is attracted to a telescope. It will observe Pluto during the final months of the New Horizons project.
You never can tell perhaps someday they will find a way to have man visit Pluto.