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Is Pluto a Planet?

Is Pluto a Planet?. Dr John K. Davies & Dr Suzie Ramsay Howat. UK Astronomy Technology Centre, Royal Observatory, Edinburgh, Scotland. The classical solar system. Planet Uranus imaged from Voyager 2. Planet Neptune from Voyager 2. Percival Lowell.

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Is Pluto a Planet?

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  1. Is Pluto a Planet? Dr John K. Davies & Dr Suzie Ramsay Howat UK Astronomy Technology Centre, Royal Observatory, Edinburgh, Scotland

  2. The classical solar system

  3. Planet Uranus imaged from Voyager 2.

  4. Planet Neptune from Voyager 2.

  5. Percival Lowell

  6. Lowell’s Tomb, shaped like Planet Saturn

  7. Clyde Tombaugh and the Pluto Telescope.

  8. Discovery of Pluto, 1930

  9. Orbits of Pluto and Neptune.

  10. Nucleus of Halley’s Comet

  11. Pluto is Shrinking

  12. Pluto is covered with ice.

  13. Pluto and Charon (Gemini Observatory)

  14. Pluto should have vanished by now!

  15. Mercury and Venus: Planets without Moons

  16. 9064 Johndavies. A minor planet • Discovered 1993 • Status: Main belt asteroid • Diameter: about 6km • Brightness: V=17-18 • Composition: Rocky • Dist from Sun 2.1-2.7 AU

  17. 243 Ida and Dactyl Ida: Size about 56 km long. Dactyl: Size about 1.5 km.

  18. 45 Eugenia and its moon. Eugenia size ~215km Satellite size ~13 km Period ~4.7 days

  19. Eugenia, The Movie

  20. Pluto has an atmosphere

  21. Pluto Express Mission. 2020?

  22. Comets in the Oort Cloud

  23. Comet Hale-Bopp

  24. Interstellar comet (never seen) Comet Orbits Long Period Comet, like Hale-Bopp Short Period Comet.

  25. Gerard Kuiper 1905-1973

  26. Kenneth Edgeworth. 1880-1973

  27. Jane Luuand Dave Jewitt

  28. University of Hawaii 2.2m Telescope

  29. Discovery of 1992 QB1

  30. The Classical Kuiper Belt

  31. The Plutinos

  32. 1998 WW31 a Kuiper Belt Object with a satellite

  33. Some of the the largest known Kuiper Belt Objects

  34. Stop Press – ‘Sedna’

  35. Sedna: EKO or Oort Cloud Object?

  36. Sedna. Planet10?

  37. Orbital Elements and Stable Regions

  38. Comet Ring as predicted by Fred Whipple in 1964, virtually what we today call the Kuiper Belt

  39. According to ‘First Steps to Astronomy and Geography’, Hatchard & Son, London, 1828 there are 11 planets. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Vesta, Juno, Ceres, Pallas, Jupiter, Saturn and Herschel (Uranus) Sun Ceres Venus Pallas Earth Juno Vesta Mars But 4 of these are no longer in lists of planets published today

  40. Tradition in Astronomy Lunar Sea! Constellations

  41. What makes a planet? • It goes around a star.

  42. Io and the Moon are not planets because they don’t go around a star.

  43. What makes a planet? • It goes around a star. • It does not generate heat internally.

  44. Jupiter is a planet. since it is not heated by nuclear reactions.

  45. What makes a planet? • It goes around a star. • It does not make heat by nuclear reactions. • It is spherical.

  46. So MOST asteroids are not planets since they have not collapsed to spherical shapes.

  47. What makes a planet? • It goes around a star. • It does not make heat by nuclear reactions • It is (more-or-less) spherical. • It is bigger than 1000km in diameter

  48. Is Pluto a Planet? Please raise hands for yes

  49. Or not? Please raise hands for NO

  50. Pluto is a small icy planet Like Neptune’s moon Triton

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