PLUTO IS A PLANET !!!!
The general public is in a state of confusion currently, due to
the fact that the Hayden Planetarium in New York City has taken Pluto off its
list of planets.
No need to be confused however, as regardless of what the Hayden has to say,
Pluto is still a planet. Let's start at the beginning.
Pluto was discovered in 1930, by Clyde Tombaugh, an Astronomer at the Lowell
Observatory in Flagstaff Arizona. He examined hundreds of photographs scanning
through millions of star images, looking for an object that changed its position
among the stars; a sign that it was a planet. It was named Pluto, after the
Greek and Roman Gods of the underworld.
For years after it's discovery, we knew that it was a small planet, but it's
exact size was not known. Then in 1978, James Christy of the United States Naval
Observatory discovered its moon. It was named Charon, after the mythological
boatman who ferried the dead souls across the river Styx to the underworld. It
was the discovery of this moon that made it possible for astronomers to
calculate Pluto's size, which is now believed to be around 1400 miles across.
Recent observations and studies by the Hubble Space Telescope indicate that
the
South Pole is brighter than the North Pole, suggesting the presence of a polar
ice cap. Spectral analysis indicates that the ice cap is frozen methane. We have
also detected a very thin methane atmosphere. On Pluto, the temperature hovers
around 380 degrees below zero, with molecules moving so slowly, that despite its
tiny mass, it's gravity is strong enough to hold onto its atmosphere.
Pluto, the last planet from the Sun, is not always that. Due to the fact that
it
has a highly eccentric, or "lopsided" orbit, it sometimes comes closer
to the
Sun than Neptune. Such was the case from 1979, until 1999, when Pluto once again
became the last known planet in our Solar System.
It has been said that perhaps Pluto was actually once a moon of Neptune, but
this theory has fewer and fewer supporters. Because many small icy bodies orbit
the Sun at the same distance as Pluto, known as Kuiper Objects, many astronomers
now believe that this tiny planet was one of those bodies that was
"captured" by Neptune, and "tugged" it into it's current
orbit.
After the death of its discover a few years ago, some scientists thought that
perhaps Pluto should be de-classified as a planet, and be re-classified as a
Kuiper object. However, in 1999, The International Astronomical Union (IAU),
after very strong opposition from Astronomers world wide, decided to keep
Pluto's status as a planet.
When the New Rose Center for Earth and Space opened last year with the new
Hayden Planetarium, Pluto was listed as a Kuiper Object and not a planet. Within
the past several weeks, articles and stories in the New York Times, CNN, the
BBC, and the Associated Press, brought this to light, and it has created great
controversy and debate throughout the Astronomy and Planetarium Field. But lets
get the facts straight!
The IAU, is THE world wide official and legal organization for the naming of
stars, planets, and their classification. No astronomers, scientists,
planetariums, or private companies, can change the status of planets, or name
stars. According to Astronomers from the IAU, NASA, the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, the American Astronomical Society, the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre
for Astrophysics, and many planetariums, the Hayden Planetarium, has overstepped
its bounds. Its sole decision, which goes against the world wide astronomical
community, has confused the public into thinking that Pluto is no longer a
planet. This is an outrage. It orbits the Sun, it has a moon, it has an
atmosphere, and it has a surface that interacts with its atmosphere. These are
the attributes that most other planets have.
This act of astronomical misinformation from a world renowned scientific
institution, does not change this simple fact: PLUTO IS A PLANET!!!!
Until Next time, "Look to the Skies!!!!"