Mars isn't the only planet making headlines this week. I guess our friends over at NASA have been pretty busy, because we now have a close-up look at Pluto.
The agency released these high-resolution images of the dwarf planet. The pictures give a clear view of Pluto's landscape, a surface one geologist described as looking more like tree bark, or dragon scales, than the average terrain.
The images come from New Horizons, which is NASA’s mission to Pluto that began all the way back in 2006 - nearly ten years ago!
The pictures were actually taken on New Horizons' fly by on July 14th. The spacecraft collected a lot of data during that fly by. So much data that it might take up to a year for all of the images and information to be transmitted to earth.
Instructional Links
Interactive Online Simulation: Movement of the Planets
http://www.gunn.co.nz/astrotour/?data=tours/retrograde.xml
Video & Classroom Materials: Chasing Pluto
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/space/chasing-pluto.html
Website: New Horizons: The First Mission to the Pluto
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/newhorizons/main/index.html