Pluto (bright blob) and Charon as seen from New Horizons (Photo : NASA)
The latest photos of Pluto taken by the New Horizons spacecraft are black and white images showing the dwarf planet as a bright pixelized blob of white next to a dim set of pixels that are its moon, Charon.
While seemingly unexciting to laymen, these pixelized photos are visual confirmation New Horizons is on track for its first close encounter with Pluto on July 14. If NASA approves and funds an extension of New Horizon's mission, there will be a second flyby in 2019.
The new images were taken by the spacecraft's telescopic Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) on Jan. 25 and Jan. 27. They're the first photos taken during the spacecraft's approach to Pluto and its moons, estimated at five.
"These images of Pluto represent our first steps at turning the pinpoint of light Clyde saw in the telescopes at Lowell Observatory 85 years ago, into a planet before the eyes of the world this summer," said Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator at the Southwest Research Institute, RTT reported.
The Clyde referred to by Stern is the late American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh who discovered Pluto in 1930. NASA released New Horizon's first photos of Pluto on Tombaugh's birthday on Feb. 4, Wednesday.
During the coming months, LORRI will take hundreds of pictures of Pluto. New Horizons is closing on Pluto at 31,000 mph and has covered over three billion miles since it launched on Jan. 19, 2006.
New Horizons has seven different science instruments to study Pluto and its moons, according to CS Monitor. It will map the surface composition and temperature of Pluto and Charon; characterize the geology of both objects; study Pluto's atmosphere; search for rings and additional moons in the system, among other goals.
New Horizons will also take dust, energetic particle and solar wind measurements to characterize the space environment near Pluto as it speeds by the dwarf planet.
The objective of the $700 million New Horizons mission is to give scientists their first-ever good looks at Pluto.
