Naked Science Forum
General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: RD on 27/06/2015 02:20:32
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Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/soc/Pluto-Encounter/index.php
Closest-approach will be in about two weeks ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons
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Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/soc/Pluto-Encounter/index.php
Closest approach will be in about two weeks.
I don't understand. I thought that they had a probe that came very close to Pluto, so close as to get much better photos of it than that?
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I don't understand. I thought that they had a probe that came very close to Pluto, so close as to get much better photos of it than that?
This is the first probe to flyby Pluto : it's taken 9 years to get there.
The pictures will get exponentially better over the next two weeks.
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This is the first probe to flyby Pluto : it's taken 9 years to get there.
The pictures will get exponentially better over the next two weeks.
Thanks, RD. From what I read at a NASA site the probe will get it's closest approach in July of this year when it comes within 6,000 miles of Pluto? I wish they'd simply put a satellite into orbit that has ultra quality resolution so we can see what the surface is like.
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... I wish they'd simply put a satellite into orbit that has ultra quality resolution so we can see what the surface is like.
They'd have to equip the probe with huge retro-rockets to decelerate [ from 13km/s] so it could orbit, which would make the mission hugely more expensive.
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More detail on pluto + colour ...
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fpluto.jhuapl.edu%2FMultimedia%2FScience-Photos%2Fpics%2FHEART%2520-%25207-8-15_Pluto_color_new_NASA-JHUAPL-SWRI.png&hash=5180c6c10587cfcba8c5931553876eb0)
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/Multimedia/Science-Photos/image.php?gallery_id=2&image_id=205
4 days to closest approach
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The probe should get close enough to take pictures with resolution of <100m per pixel within a few days. But don't get too excited! It will take several weeks (probably many months) to send all the data back......
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... I wish they'd simply put a satellite into orbit that has ultra quality resolution so we can see what the surface is like.
They'd have to equip the probe with huge retro-rockets to decelerate [ from 13km/s] so it could orbit, which would make the mission hugely more expensive.
Why would they have to do that? Are you telling me that there's no way to work with the other planets to adjust it's orbit so that when it gets there it only has to bleed off much less kinetic energy?
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It would would have taken longer to get there at a slower speed, and this mission took nine years. The probe is travelling at 13km/s , the escape-velocity of tiny Pluto is about 1/10th of that, ( the probe would have to get below the escape-velocity to orbit ).
So you can have a man-made satellite in orbit around Pluto if you don't mind waiting a century for it to get there, or spend something like the Apollo-budget, (~1% of America's GDP), on craft with a monster retro-rocket.
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(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fpluto.jhuapl.edu%2FMultimedia%2FScience-Photos%2Fpics%2F7-10-15_Pluto_image_NASA-JHUAPL-SWRI%2520%25282%2529.png&hash=ee9f4f5f01cc7ba616c0a7c7a05f2af5)
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/Multimedia/Science-Photos/image.php?gallery_id=2&image_id=212
2 days to closest approach
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So you can have a man-made satellite in orbit around Pluto if you don't mind waiting a century for it to get there, or spend something like the Apollo-budget, (~1% of America's GDP), on craft with a monster retro-rocket.
Just because it takes a huge amount of fuel it doesn't mean that the cost for the rocket would be the same. A great deal of the cost of the Saturn V rocket was the cost of the research that went into design and construction of the rocket. Consider how much it cost to put the Chandra X-ray telescope into orbit; 1.6 billion. For Hubble it was 2.5 billion.
Right now they have such a rocket being tested. It's first test will be next year sometime. See:
http://www.space.com/21487-nasa-sls-biggest-rocket.html
The SLS will be the most powerful rocket ever built, and it will be safe, affordable and sustainable.
It will cost .5 billion to launch though, much less that the Hubble or Chandra telescopes.
Would you like some friendly advice? If not then please ignore this. If so then please read on: It's always best to look these things up before making any assertions as to what the facts are. I always use that as a rule of thumb myself. I hate being wrong. [:)]