| Title | Pluto's Icy "Bladed" Terrain Modeled | |
| Date | Monday January 16 2017, @11:39AM | |
| Author | martyb | |
| Topic | ||
| from the pinnacle-of-an-achievement dept. | ||
Pluto has ice and snow features (Javascript required) that appear to require the presence of an atmosphere to form:
Using a model similar to what meteorologists use to forecast weather and a computer simulation of the physics of evaporating ices, scientists have found evidence of snow and ice features on Pluto that, until now, had only been seen on Earth. Formed by erosion, the features, known as "penitentes," are bowl-shaped depressions with blade-like spires around the edge that rise several hundreds of feet.
The research, led by John Moores of York University, Toronto, and done in collaboration with scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, indicates that these icy features may also exist on other planets where environmental conditions are similar.
The identification of these ridges in Pluto's informally named Tartarus Dorsa area suggests that the presence of an atmosphere is necessary for the formation of penitentes – which Moores says would explain why they have not previously been seen on other airless icy satellites or dwarf planets. "But exotic differences in the environment give rise to features with very different scales," he adds. "This test of our terrestrial models for penitentes suggests that we may find these features elsewhere in the solar system, and in other solar systems, where the conditions are right."
New Horizons measured Pluto's surface atmospheric pressure at about 1 Pascal when it flew by. Mars has an average of around 600 Pascals, ranging from 30 Pa at the peak of Olympus Mons to 1,155 Pa at the bottom of Hellas Planitia. Earth's average at sea level is about 101,300 Pa. Titan's surface pressure is greater than Earth's, at about 146,700 Pa.
Penitentes as the origin of the bladed terrain of Tartarus Dorsa on Pluto (DOI: 10.1038/nature20779) (DX)
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printed from SoylentNews, Pluto's Icy "Bladed" Terrain Modeled on 2024-04-19 19:12:50