The planets of the Solar System

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Pluto

The ninth planet

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Planet Profile

Mass	1.29 x 10 22 kg
Diameter	2,300 km
Mean density	2,030 g/m³
Escape velocity	1,100 m/sec
Average distance from Sun	39.53 Astronomic Units (AU)
Rotation period	6.39 Earth days
Revolution period	247.7 Earth years
Obliquity (tilt of axis)	122.5°
Orbit inclination	17.15°
Orbit eccentricity (deviation from circular)	0.248
Mean surface temperature	37 °K
Albedo (reflectivity)	about 0.5
Atmospheric components	perhaps methane and nitrogen
Surface materials	perhaps methane ice

0 °K (Kelvin) = -273.16 °C

1 AU (Astronomic Unit) = 149,597,893 km

Clearest View

This is the clearest view yet of the distant planet Pluto and its moon, Charon, as revealed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. The image was taken by the European Space Agency's Faint Object Camera on February 21, 1994 when the planet was 4.4 billion km (2.6 billion mi) from Earth. Hubble's corrected optics show the two objects as clearly separate and sharp disks. This has allowed astronomers to measure (to within about 1 percent) Pluto's diameter of 2,320 km (1,440 mi) and Charon's diameter of 1,270 km (790 mi). The Hubble observations show that Charon is bluer than Pluto. This means that both worlds have different surface composition and structure. A bright highlight on Pluto suggests it has a smoothly reflecting surface layer.

Clearest View, see above: JPG-Format, RGB-Truecolor (24 Bit), Size: 7,5 KB

If you want more informations about, you can connect the NASA here at once.

NASA Homepage

And there'll be something interesting informations about spaceflight at the Bavarian broadcasting on the television channel "Bayern 3", to receive on satellite. After closedown you can see the "SPACE NIGHT" every day. Here you can find interesting facts about the moonlanding, the German spacemissions (D1 and D2) and much more. Most beautiful are the "Earth Views".

See it !

The Space-Night Program

"SPACE NIGHT" is also available at the World-Wide-Web

Space-Night

Here you have some links for the theme:

German Aerospace Research Establishment

DLR

MIR

MIR 97

MARS 96

Mars 96 Mission

Since July 4, 1997, the American Independence Day, a probe has landed on Mars after 21 years. The images, which the probe has transmitted, are fascinated. It opens a strange world on the other side of Earth and the scientists are filled with enthusiasm.

If you want more informations and see the pictures of the Pathfinder-Probe, you can here call up the Web-Site.

NASA Pathfinder Site

Since summer 1997 the Global Surveyor is in the orbit of Mars. His job is to cartography the Red Planet with the latest technology. This mission is part of a greater project, which intended to bring human beings to Mars and back in the next century.

You can get further details at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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