back to article Pluto's blushing complexion riddle solved by boffins

Boffins using the new Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) on the Hubble telescope have figured out what makes Pluto the colour it is. The South West Research Institute's eggheads discovered a strong ultraviolet-wavelength absorber on the dwarf planet's surface, which suggests that there are complex hydrocarbon and nitrile …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Dwarf Planet

    Dear IAU,

    Your mom thought I was big enough.

    Yours sincerely,

    Pluto.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re:Dwarf Planet

      Oh yeah?

      Step aside, Tiny!

      Regards

      Jupiter.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re:Dwarf Planet

        Dear Jupiter:

        Oh, honey, let's don't start this again. We all know you're sensitive about your figure, and it can't be easy to make a life for yourself as a failed star. But it's no good putting yourself forward -- especially when it means getting in the way of looks like mine.

        Love,

        Saturn

        1. stucs201

          Re: Dwarf Planet

          Dear Sol,

          Can you ask your planets to keep the noise down?

          Regards,

          Proxima Centauri

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Dear Universe,

            You're at it again, I've called the inter-universal noise police.

            Regards,

            Universe 443982442 (Dave)

        2. Richard Wharram

          Failed star?

          At 100 times too small I'd say Jupiter has more than failed. :)

          It's 10 times too small to be a brown dwarf even.

          Oh, and Saturn; maybe you are less massive but since your volume is almost identical you still fill out your tracksuit to more than bursting... honey.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Maybe, dear, but

            who can complain when I make it look so good?

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Hey, you kids!

              Keep it down out there!

              Don't make me turn this spiral arm around!

              - Sol (AKA Dad)

          2. GitMeMyShootinIrons

            ... and that ring is way too bling.

    2. Anonymous John
      Unhappy

      I suggest you keep quiet. Look what happened to me when I complained.

      Yours

      The Asteroid Belt.

      1. Graham Marsden
        Megaphone

        Any more trouble out of you lot and I'll be calling the Vogons!

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Dear IAU

      Could you please consider renaming the wannabe planet Pluto to something else that would leave no doubts as to it's stature, such as "Sarkozy".

      Yours sincerely,

      David Cameron

  2. Aaron Em

    Bit blurry innit?

    What, did they have to take out COSTAR to make room for the new spectrograph?

    1. Aaron Em

      Oh shit they did!

      No wonder you can't make out anything in that picture.

    2. Annihilator
      Boffin

      re: COSTAR

      You know COSTAR was made redundant, right? The original cameras and spectrographs have long since been replaced with new ones that corrected for the misaligned mirror. They're all sitting in various museums around the States.

      The real question is why COSTAR was left in there for 7 years doing sweet FA - may as well have taken it out in 2002 when they took the last original camera out.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    When did Pluto turn into Che Guevara?

    As Title

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Paris Hilton

      Che Guevara a reddish, blushing dwarf?

      But I thought he was good with the ladies (not much with anything else, mind).

  4. Mike Moyle
    Coat

    Can we PLEASE stop calling Pluto a dwarf?

    Hasn't anyone told the IAU that the more sensitive term is "little planet"? (...although some prefer just referring to it as a "planette"...)

    1. Sorry that handle is already taken. Silver badge

      Planetarily challenged?

  5. ravenviz Silver badge
    Coat

    If Pluto were a country

    If Pluto were a country, by surface area it would be slightly smaller than Russia, but still two-thirds bigger than Canada.

    So does that make Russia a dwarf planet?

    And Canada would have a diameter 77% that of Pluto, somewhere between 2007OR10 and Sedna.

  6. Ken Hagan Gold badge

    That picture looks fake

    It contains no more than a few dozen pixels worth of information within a circular disc that requires thousands of pixels to render its edge sharply. And at several light-hours distance from the Sun, it can't be gassy clouds making everything fuzzy. I call shenanigans.

    1. BlueGreen

      very well observed, hadn't considered it that way

      however happened to be looking at wiki page <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto#Appearance_and_surface>

      "Current maps have been produced from images from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), which offers the highest resolution currently available, and show considerably more detail,[69] resolving variations several hundred kilometres across, including polar regions and large bright spots.[70] The maps are produced by complex computer processing, which find the best-fit projected maps for the few pixels of the Hubble images"

      So you're right, it is a synthetic image derived from almost negligable data, but not deliberate deceit.

      1. Chris 96
        IT Angle

        image derived from almost negligable data

        cant they just use that software that CSI has - you know, the one where they can take a segment of an image no more than a few pixels big and resolve it into a sharp readable number plate or face or whatever just by pressing a few button?

        And another thing: why is all CSI software keyboard driven rather than mouse - noone uses a mouse on that show, not even to marquee an image segment.

        1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
          Paris Hilton

          But why would you want to see a readable number pluto on Pluto?

  7. Luther Blissett

    Talk about the Man in the Moon

    Is it just me or is that a slightly out of focus picture of a giant Alien head?

    1. A. Coatsworth Silver badge
      Alien

      By Aiur!

      That's the face of Executor Artanis, right there

  8. Joe User

    Re: Dwarf Planet

    Dear Pluto,

    Quit yer whinging!

    Regards,

    Titan

    1. Armando 123

      Hear hear!

      Sincerely,

      Triton

      1. Graham Marsden

        Oh don't you lot start too!

        - Luna

        1. Michael Hoffmann Silver badge

          Hors d'oeuvres the lot of you!

          - Sagittarius A*

  9. DanceMan
    Joke

    Moons?

    Pluto's got fleas?

  10. Mephistro
    Pint

    I must confess...

    ... that I was on the brink of making a Uranus joke, but happily, I didn't!

  11. Local Group
    Childcatcher

    Because they are under copyright,

    no more names of celestial bodies in the local group. Unless, of course, AC feels compelled to mention Kim Kardashian. (UGH)

    1. Kharkov
      Facepalm

      Did someone mention Kim Kardashian?

      Well now you've left yourself open to comments about...

      HEAVENLY BODIES!

      1. Local Group
        Childcatcher

        "A sudden star, it shot through liquid air..."

        Kim Kardashian, like Belinda in Pope's 'Rape of the Lock', is a new star in the Heavens.

        This beautiful sun must be named.

        How does Hippo Majoris work for you?

        It works for me.

  12. This post has been deleted by its author

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    No Klingons for you

    Thank you.

    Uranus

  14. Irony Deficient

    Romanes eunt domus! (redux)

    Local Group, “Majoris” is a comparative adjective declined in the genitive case, so it doesn’t work for me. If you intended “Hippo” to be used in its original Greek sense, then I’d suggest “Caballa Magna” as a euphonic grammatical substitute. “Caballa Major” could be used only if there were also a “Caballa Minor” in the heavens to compare it against. (I am completely unacquainted with the appearance of this new star, and do not intend to search the skies to gaze upon it.)

    1. Local Group
      Childcatcher

      Canis Majoris was bespoke.

      So I went for the double entendre contained in 'Hippo.'

      Hippo. "The hippopotamus is recognizable by its barrel-shaped torso, enormous mouth and teeth, nearly hairless body, stubby legs and tremendous size. It is the third largest land mammal by weight ." (Wikipedia)

      Hippo. The area of female Homo sapien's torso below and contigious to the waist.

      When referring to the Kardashians, the correct proper noun is Romany and not Romanes .

    2. Local Group
      Childcatcher

      @ID

      "How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the

      card, or equivocation will undo us."

  15. Irony Deficient

    bespoke = spoken for?

    Local Group, I gladly bow to your superior knowledge of Kardashiana, and I wasn’t previously aware of that second definition of “hippo”, so your double entendre was lost on me. But please, for the sake of Johann Bayer, remember that “Majoris” is genitive; the constellation’s name is Canis Major (its nominative form). Proper use of both forms can be seen in a sentence like “Sirius is in Canis Major; in fact, Sirius is α Canis Majoris.”

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. Local Group
      Happy

      @Irony Deficient

      Say what strange motive, Moderator, could compel

      A user to use a word and not use it well?

      Oh, say what stranger cause, yet unheard

      Could make an affable reader reject that word?

    3. John 62
      Headmaster

      hippo

      ἱππο actually means horse

      πόταμος means river

  16. Irony Deficient

    The Shape of the Flock

    What dire Offence from gen’tive Cauſes ſprings,

    What mighty Conteſts riſe from trivial Things,

    I ſing — This Verſe to L― G―, Muſe! is due;

    This, ev’n Miſs Hilton may vouchſafe to view:

    Slight is the Subject, but not ſo the Praiſe,

    If She inſpire, and He approve my Lays.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Hither the Pedants and the Wits infeſt,

    To taſte awhile the Pleaſures of a Jeſt;

    In various Talk th’inſtructive hours they paſt,

    Who ſaved the Day, or changed the Climate laſt:

    One ſpeaks the Glory of Verity Stob,

    And one deſcribes a charming BOFH* Job.

    A third interprets Latin, Greek, and French;

    At ev’ry Word a Reader’s Jaws will clench.

    Beer, or the Dram, ſupply each Pauſe of Chat,

    With whinging, laughing, ogling, and all that.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    * — Pronounc’d “boffitch” for Reaſon of Metre.

    1. Local Group

      To a Poet on the Brink

      Sir, you seem too nonchalant

      Your witty verse, your cutsie font.

      On this point though, we're all agreed,

      Genius has pushed you to supersede,

      Keats and Shelly, Pope and Milton.

      Yet all you can do is dote on Hilton.

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