January 2006 Top Stories
»» Pluto is Colder Than It Should Be
[Tuesday, January 3, 2006] Smithsonian astronomers using the Submillimeter Array (SMA) on Mauna Kea in Hawaii have taken direct measurements of thermal heat and found that Pluto is indeed colder than expected, colder even than Charon.
»» Astronomers Seize Rare Opportunity to Measure Distant Charon
[Wednesday, January 4, 2006] Being in the right place at the right time gave a group of Massachusetts research astronomers a unique opportunity to study Pluto's largest moon Charon.
»» Kuiper Belt Moons Are Starting to Seem Typical
[Friday, January 13, 2006] Until recently, Pluto was thought to be an odd bird in the outer reaches of the solar system because it has a moon. But Pluto is getting a lot of company these days. Of the four largest objects in the Kuiper belt, three have one or more moons.
»» New Horizons: The PI's Perspective: We're in Flight Configuration
[Sunday, January 15, 2006] New Horizons is now well inside T-100 hours from our planned launch time on Tuesday. Subject to the approval of the Launch Readiness Review (LRR) to be held on Jan. 15, and the weather, we will be proceeding toward our planned launch on Tuesday.
»» WHT and TNG Observations Prove that the Large Trans-Neptunian Object 2005 FY9 is Very Similar to Pluto
[Monday, January 16, 2006] Visible and near-infrared spectroscopic observations show that the recently discovered trans-neptunian object (TNO) 2005 FY9 is very similar to Pluto.
»» NASA's New Horizons is On its Way to Pluto
[Thursday, January 19, 2006] NASA's New Horizons spacecraft has launched at 2:00 pm EST from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida aboard a fast-moving Atlas V rocket.
»» New Horizons "Tidbits" - 22 January 2006
[Sunday, January 22, 2006] "Things are going well here at the APL MOC. New Horizons is operating virtually flawlessly. TCM 1a and 1b are planned for 28 and 30 Jan, respectively, with a total delta-V of 18 m/s- which is far smaller than the 92 m/s budgeted for pre-flight."
»» NASA New Horizons: The PI's Perspective: On The Road at Last
[Tuesday, January 24, 2006] Now that we are safely on our way, we know that our journey will take precisely 3462.7 days, i.e., from 19:00 UTC on Jan, 19, 2006, to 12:00 UTC July 14, 2015, to reach Pluto. Encounter science operations will begin about 150 days before we reach Pluto.
»» New Horizons Update 28 January 2006
[Saturday, January 28, 2006] "New Horizons performed its first trajectory correction maneuver, TCM-1A, at 1900 UTC today. This was a 5 m/sec calibration burn and validation burn of our propulsion system and delta-V thrusters."
»» New Horizons Mission: The PI's Perspective - Our Aim Is True
[Tuesday, January 31, 2006] New Horizons is nearing completion of its second week in flight, and all continues to go well. As Project Manger Glen Fountain is proud of saying, New Horizons is now safely away from Earth, in the cold vacuum she was born to thrive in.
