NASA spacecraft to reveal the icy glory of Pluto

[Legend]

Hype! can't wait for the photos.

You can "watch" them download lol

DSN Now

[Mmm_fish_tacos]

Greet!  

[Legend]

Greet!  

Earth isn't a planet now

[Mmm_fish_tacos]

Earth isn't a planet now

What?

[Legend]

What?

Neil Degrasse Tyson thinks only Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are the real planets. Would rather reclassify Earth as a dwarf planet then return Pluto to planet status lol.

[Mmm_fish_tacos]

Neil Degrasse Tyson thinks only Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are the real planets. Would rather reclassify Earth as a dwarf planet then return Pluto to planet status lol.

Okay, that's going to far.

[Legend]

[Legend]

[Legend]

Plate fricken tectonics
Unconfirmed

[DD_Bwest]

it may be  geologically active   thats freagin exciting!

[Legend]

it may be  geologically active   thats freagin exciting!

It's powered by plutonium.

[DD_Bwest]

[Legend]

[Mmm_fish_tacos]

Elite Dangerous on Pluto

[On Tuesday NASA's New Horizons probe flew by Pluto and snapped the clearest images ever shot of the dwarf planet, revealing towering mountains of ice and a mostly young surface free of impact craters. The pictures reveal the way Pluto's various ices have melted and reformed, likely due to tidal heating from gravitational interaction with Charon.

We'd like to join the chorus of voices congratulating NASA on the incredible achievement, and we'd like to answer a question we've heard a number of times already from the community.

What does New Horizons mean for Pluto and Charon in Elite: Dangerous?

[

Beautiful shot of Pluto and Charon in Elite: Dangerous by Aimicara on Imgur[/size][/center]

You'll notice Pluto and Charon look a little different in Elite: Dangerous, though we're pleased by how closely our simulation has matched the 'smooth' heart-shaped area on Pluto. Our simulation assumed a more dramatic effect from the mild volcanism caused by tidal heating from interaction with Charon, which would uniformly refresh the surface over time. There's still 1,300 years between now and 3301, which means around five more orbits and five more heating/cooling cycles between today and the era of Elite: Dangerous. It's possible the renewed surface could spread to cover the entire body by 3301!

Another major factor in the difference is the data available to our simulation "In Elite: Dangerous, we use real world data whenever it's available to make objects as real as we can make them," says Assistant Art Director Jon Bottone. With a few exceptions, the surfaces you see are derived from the custom simulation based on things like the distance from the star and Newton's second law, the object's mass, temperature, composition, surface age, atmosphere, chemistry, tidal heating, radiative heating, impacts from other bodies during formation and so forth.

"For familiar objects like Earth, Mars and our moon, we can use real height map data to build a truly accurate model of the surface," he continues. "In the case of Earth and our terraformed Mars, we've used real height map data, simulated the levels of the oceans and added life to the surface in order to make the geography as accurate as we can make it. Those height maps are invaluable to making familiar planets look real, and if NASA is able to release that data for Pluto and Charon – or any other planetary body –we should be able to incorporate that in the future too."[/color][/justify]

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Pluto, as seen by the New Horizons probe

So why don't we just paint a new surface texture based on NASA's new images?  

"All our planets are built using a sophisticated simulation so that one day you can get close to them. Really close," Bottone says. "Right now every planet can only be observed from afar, but Elite: Dangerous is designed for the future, and by sticking to the simulation and constantly improving it to make it as real as possible, we can be sure the canyons and mountains you see from space will accurately be reflected when you skim close to the surface, or even land upon it."

In short: we're leaving Pluto and Charon to the simulation for now because we want to land on them someday, but we'll improve the simulation when we have the necessary data because flying along that four-mile deep canyon on Charon looks irresistible. Thanks to NASA's hard work, that day may be closer than ever.

[Dr. Pezus]

New Horizons Finds Nitrogen Glaciers and Hazy Air on Pluto - Scientific American