The smallest object in the solar system: Pluto

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04 September, 2011

Pluto, which was considered as a planet until last year, is at the farthest reaches of the Solar System.
This small celestial body is a very “cold” place, with a nominal temperature of -238^oC. Inside this freezing coldness, Pluto has a very thin atmosphere. However, the atmosphere is in a gaseous form only during those times when its elliptical orbit carries it close to the Sun. At other times, the atmosphere turns into an ice mass. In short, Pluto is a dead mass of ice.
The diameter of Pluto is 2,300 kilometers.
One year in Pluton, which is 6.0 billion kilometers away from the Sun, equals to 248 Earth years.
Its size is 1/6 of our Moon. Its density is twice that of water. It is the orb with the most elliptical angle of orbit . Therefore, it was closer to the Sun than Neptune was between the years 1978 and 2000.
Its only known satellite remained as Charon for a long time. Charon always shows the same face to Pluto, just like the Moon does to Earth. In 2005, it was found that Pluto had two more satellites, these satellites were named as Hydra and Nix in the year 2006.

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