Hello All!   
      
   Fifth Moon Discovered Around Pluto    
      
   July 13, 2012: A team of astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has   
   discovered another moon orbiting the dwarf planet Pluto.   
      
   They say the new moon, Pluto's 5th, is likely irregular in shape and 6 to 15   
   miles across. Provisionally designated S/2012 (134340) 1, it was detected in   
   nine separate sets of images taken by Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 on June 26,   
   27, 29, and July 7 and 9.  The moon circles Pluto in a 58,000 mile-diameter   
   orbit.    
      
   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtcIbJKZZQQ   
      
   This image, taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, shows five moons orbiting   
   the distant, icy dwarf planet Pluto. The green circle marks the newly   
   discovered moon, designated P5, as photographed by Hubble's Wide Field Camera   
   3 on July 7. The observations will help scientists in their planning for the   
   July 2015 flyby of Pluto by NASA's New Horizons spacecraft. P4 was uncovered   
   in Hubble imagery in 2011. (Credit: NASA; ESA; M. Showalter, SETI Institute)    
   "The moons form a series of neatly nested orbits, a bit like Russian dolls,"   
   notes team leader Mark Showalter of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif.   
      
   The Pluto team is intrigued that such a small planet can have such a complex   
   collection of satellites. The new discovery provides additional clues for   
   unraveling how the Pluto system formed and evolved. The favored theory is that   
   all the moons are relics of a collision between Pluto and another large Kuiper   
   Belt object billions of years ago. (The Kuiper Belt is a broad zone of icy   
   Pluto-like bodies orbiting beyond Neptune. Pluto itself is considered to be a   
   Kuiper Belt object.)   
      
   The new detection will help scientists navigate NASA's New Horizons spacecraft   
   through the Pluto system in 2015, when it makes an historic and long-awaited   
   high-speed flyby of the distant world.    
      
   A ScienceCast video previews New Horizons visit to Pluto in 2015. Play itThe   
   team is using Hubble to scour the Pluto system to uncover potential hazards to   
   New Horizons. Moving past the dwarf planet at a speed of 30,000 miles per   
   hour, the spacecraft could be destroyed in a collision with even a   
   BB-shot-size piece of orbital debris.   
      
   "The discovery of so many small moons indirectly tells us that there must be   
   lots of small particles lurking unseen in the Pluto system," says Harold   
   Weaver of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel,   
   Md.   
      
   "The inventory of the Pluto system we're taking now with Hubble will help the   
   New Horizons team design a safer trajectory for the spacecraft," adds Alan   
   Stern of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., the mission's   
   principal investigator.   
      
   Pluto's largest moon, Charon, was discovered in 1978 in observations made at   
   the United States Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. Hubble observations in   
   2006 uncovered two additional small moons, Nix and Hydra. In 2011 another   
   moon, P4, was found in Hubble data.   
      
   In the years following the New Horizons Pluto flyby, astronomers plan to use   
   Hubble's planned successor, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, for follow-up   
   observations. The Webb telescope's infrared vision will be able to measure the   
   surface chemistry of Pluto, its moons, and many other bodies that lie in the   
   distant Kuiper Belt along with Pluto.    
      
   For more information about New Horizons and its mission to Pluto visit   
   http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/   
      
      
   Production editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA   
      
   More Information    
   Dwarf Planet Mysteries Beckon to New Horizons -- Science@NASA    
      
   New Horizons Becomes Closest Spacecraft to Pluto -- Science@NASA    
      
   Visit to Pluto -- NASA ScienceCast video    
      
   The Pluto Team members are M. Showalter (SETI Institute), H.A. Weaver (Applied   
   Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University), and S.A. Stern, A.J. Steffl,   
   and M.W. Buie (Southwest Research Institute). -- Science@NASA   
      
   The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between   
   NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in   
   Greenbelt, Md., manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute   
   (STScI) in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for   
   NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in   
   Washington, D.C.   
       
      
   Regards,   
      
   Roger    
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: NCS BBS - Houma, LA - (1:3828/7)