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New Horizons

r4pt0r

By r4pt0r
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Newt

Newt

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The IAU put out a list of name candidates for features on Pluto a while ago. I saw one copy briefly, and it is consistent with the underworld theme generally. I plan to try to get a copy soon, and may post more about it then.

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Ikaneko

Ikaneko

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If there are valleys/river-like things we could name them after the rivers of the under world. I still think Dwarven names for a dwarf planet would be great. The twin craters Fili and Kili. :P I'm going to contact the IAU...

Friggin' Hobbit Fanboys/girls man.

I would like the Lethe and the Acheron. Also the Cocytus, the less well known of them all.

I am contacting the IAU to scream at Neil DeGrasse Tyson to change the names of the moons to the Three Furies. Wish me luck.

Anyway. All aboard the Hype-New Horizons!

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Ikaneko

Ikaneko

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Less Hobbity names, hmm. Rename Pluto Aule? Name the moons after the first Dwarves? :P I agree with the Furies idea, if they are going to stick with the under world theme. Charon maketh no sense, iirc. Waht about the Styx?

Gah. Too mainstream.

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Camacha

Camacha

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I love how pictures like that resolve random dots into a system.

I am pure hype right now. Let's reroute the hype train to New Horizon's Pluto Encounter!

Did this post really contribute anything to this thread?

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Newt

Newt

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Roman Underworld or christian Hell names? :P

Both, probably, and more. Off the top of my head I do not recall the average resolution that Pluto will be mapped in, but there will probably be quite a lot of distinct features to be seen, and named. Ceres has names that it will be assigned from Gods of all the inhabited continents, Mars by this time has gone through most of the main Mars scientists and has resorted to small towns as crater names. There are tons of features on essentially any object, and they cannot be sane and limit their choices to one mythology. If they do, it will change eventually.

(That said I do not recall specifically christian hellish names on the list, they may avoid them for fear of offending people, or I may not recognize them because of my limited familiarity with that religion)

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Frida Space

Frida Space

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Quick update on the mission:

++++++++

...the mission’s science, engineering and spacecraft operations teams have configured the piano-sized probe for distant observations of the Pluto system, starting with a long-range photo shoot that begins Jan. 25.

Snapped by New Horizons’ telescopic Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager, known as LORRI, those pictures will give mission scientists a continually improving look at the dynamics of those moons. And they’ll play a critical role in navigating the spacecraft as it covers the remaining 135 million miles (220 million kilometers) to Pluto.

Over the next few months, LORRI will take hundreds of pictures of Pluto against star fields to refine the team’s estimates of New Horizons’ distance to Pluto. Though the Pluto system will resemble little more than bright dots in the camera’s view until May, mission navigators will use those data to design course-correction maneuvers that aim the spacecraft toward its flyby target point this summer. The first such maneuver could occur as early as March.

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notsosmart

notsosmart

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Quick update on the mission:

++++++++

...the mission’s science, engineering and spacecraft operations teams have configured the piano-sized probe for distant observations of the Pluto system, starting with a long-range photo shoot that begins Jan. 25.

Snapped by New Horizons’ telescopic Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager, known as LORRI, those pictures will give mission scientists a continually improving look at the dynamics of those moons. And they’ll play a critical role in navigating the spacecraft as it covers the remaining 135 million miles (220 million kilometers) to Pluto.

Over the next few months, LORRI will take hundreds of pictures of Pluto against star fields to refine the team’s estimates of New Horizons’ distance to Pluto. Though the Pluto system will resemble little more than bright dots in the camera’s view until May, mission navigators will use those data to design course-correction maneuvers that aim the spacecraft toward its flyby target point this summer. The first such maneuver could occur as early as March.

Can't wait for the first images!! I know it will be nothing more than a couple of dots, but it will be so exciting!

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Frida Space

Frida Space

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Off the top of my head I do not recall the average resolution that Pluto will be mapped in, but there will probably be quite a lot of distinct features to be seen, and named.

LORRI resolution

Pluto: ~100 m/pixel

Charon: ~260 m/pixel

Nix: ~460 m/pixel (95 pixels across)

Hydra: ~1.1 km/pixel (55 pixels across)

Kerberos: ~3.2 km/pixel (4 pixels across)

Styx: ~3.2 km/pixel (3 pixels across)

Source: www.boulder.swri.edu/pkb/ssr/ssr-lorri.pdf

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Newt

Newt

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Icarus has a ton of new papers on Pluto, if anyone is interested. Unfortunately for some, to view the papers online it appears that you need either to pay 35USD/pdf, or have the access through some other means (i.e. school).

It looks like some people are suggesting that Pluto and Charon trade some gas between their atmospheres, and there is quite a good number of papers on Pluto's climate, atmosphere, and atmospheric tides (which must be huge). I suppose geology will have to wait till we have actual photos of the surface:rolleyes:.

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Frida Space

Frida Space

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Unfortunately for some, to view the papers online it appears that you need either to pay 35USD/pdf, or have the access through some other means (i.e. school).

Why should they make it pay tho? I'd prefer a website full of ads, where maybe you have to watch a video or something before reading a paper, but it should be free. Science is free :(

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Newt

Newt

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Why should they make it pay tho? I'd prefer a website full of ads, where maybe you have to watch a video or something before reading a paper, but it should be free. Science is free :(

I agree. It is rather annoying.

Copyright of ICARUS is the property of Academic Press Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.

I am pretty sure that I cannot email it except for to myself. Phooey.

Edited by Newt
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epoca

epoca

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A good article from Alan Stern (the mission PI) on how New Horizons will study Pluto's "atmosphere": http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/overview/piPerspective.php?page=piPerspective_01_23_2015

Seriously can't wait for the mission to begin. If I had a time machine, the first thing I'd do wouldn't be going back to the dinosaurs, but instead fastforwarding to July 14th, 2015.

On a side note, sweet post man! Really informative. I'll be following this thread.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Frida Space

Frida Space

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A few highlights from the newest Reddit AMA with Alan Stern & the New Horizons mission:

(just to make things clear, the answers below are from the mission team, obviously not from myself :P)

What's the future of communication for long range interstellar craft? With my small amount of reading I've done, it looks like New Horizons uses X-Band and will only get 1kbps when it's as far out as Pluto.

The next step in higher rate communication at long distances is laser comm. Instead of sending a broad beam of X-band energy, send a very focused light, preserving a lot of the power. It would make communications 10-100 times faster.

When do you think the LORRI pictures will come back that will turn Pluto and Charon from astronomical objects into geological objects?

A few weeks before the closest approach on July 14th should be the transition between geological object and astronomical object. Pluto is already not a point source (a few pixels across) and a few weeks before we will start being able to make out the albedo patterns, and then actual geologic features as we get closer and closer!

Given the extreme range you're dealing with, what is the maximum data rate available to you via the DSN? What frequency and modulation are you using, and how did you decide on a balance between bit error rate and bandwidth?

The typical rate we can downlink at is 1kbps. Just a trickle, really. There are a couple tricks we can play, though. First off, we can transmit with both our transmitters at the same time. That can nearly double our rate. Also, as the DSN station looks higher and higher in the sky, it gets less thermal interference from our own atmosphere here on Earth. At maximum elevation angles, we can get almost twice the data rate again. So, the maximum rate we downlink at from Pluto is 4kbps.

Thankfully, all the geometry is known ahead of time, so we do program the spacecraft to "rate step" through the pass. Our receiver is sensitive enough to lock to a signal as low as -160 dBm, though our commands are usually received at -120 dBm. That is what you get when you use a DSN antenna almost as big as a football field, and transmit at 20 kW.

How visible (to all instruments on board, not just cameras) do you expect Pluto's atmosphere to be?

The short answer is almost all the instruments can play a part. Long answer: we are going to be imaging clouds with LORRI and MVIC (the "cameras"). With Alice, we are going to look through the upper atmosphere by tracking the UV light from stars we are looking at as we are moving (like looking at the Moon through moving clouds). Similarly with REX, we are going to be looking at the lower atmosphere by having the DSN send us a signal at X-band, and have REX record how that signal wobbles through it. We can even "sniff" the atmosphere with our in-situ plasma instruments PEPSSI and SWAP.

Can you describe the details of the radio science experiment you will do during the Pluto flyby?

In broad strokes, the DSN sends up a 20 kW X-band signal that is very very stable in frequency and amplitude. Onboard, we have an ultra-stable oscillator that the RF system uses to down-convert the signal and send it over to the REX instrument. REX has a digital filter (also referenced to the oscillator) that splits the signal up into in-phase and quadrature components, and then records it on the Spacecraft. By analyzing that signal, our scientists can look for any faint wobbles in amplitude and phase, and determine the nature of the atmosphere the signal had to travel through.

What power level/flux do we receive on earth from NH transmissions? What power does the spacecraft receive from Earth transmissions?

Our typical received power at Pluto is around -120 dBm. Our receiver is so sensitive it would lock to something as low as -160 dBm.

Have you already planned the parameters for your trajectory correction manoeuvre? How much would you miss Pluto without it?

We have an opportunity for a trajectory correction maneuver (TCM) March 10. We are still refining our plans but may have a TCM that would be about a 1 m/s burn. Without this TCM we could be off by ~10,000 km.

My questions:

How many other moons in stable orbits could there be around Pluto?

There could be lots, particularly far from Pluto. In close, the system is gravitationally jammed packed, so we expect at most only a few. But then again, this is first time exploration, so we could be really surprised!

How is the spacecraft doing on fuel? How much DeltaV is left approx.?

We are doing great on fuel. After Pluto encounter, and all the downlink, we will still have ~130 m/s left in DeltaV.

When will New Horizons cross the heliosphere, and will the probe still be alive by then?

Because the location of the heliopause "breathes" with the activity of the sun and moves by many AU, so the exact date is impossible to determine. It won't be until the late 2030s at the earliest. The RTG power supply will be able to keep critical systems powered until the late 2030s.

Read the rest of the AMA here.

Edited by Frida Space
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