"Canyon" on Charon, Pluto is a giant rift crust

A few days ago the probe NASA New Horizons sent to Earth colorful pictures of Charon, the largest moon of Pluto. Now scientists have received another batch of images in the study of which has become possible to study the complicated history of Charon - a она planetoid have really complicated . In general, it has long been known that Charon, if you compare the size of the satellite and the main planet or planetoid - the largest satellite in the solar system. Its diameter is only half the diameter of Pluto. Previously, scientists believed that this object is covered with lots of craters. Instead, it turned out that Charon many mountains, canyons, plains. Plus, the surface of Pluto is not uniform in composition.

Pictures Charon high resolution obtained by New Horizons July 14 and sent to Earth on September 21 show scientists a "belt", a huge canyon, passing through all the planetoid. The length of it is 1,600 kilometers, is four times larger than the Grand Canyon on Earth. Depth - twice. It seems that in the past, Charon was very active in geological terms.



"It seems that all the cracked bark of Charon", - says John Spencer, a spokesman for the project team. The team also found that the plain south of the canyon Charon covered lots of craters than in the north of the region, which is an indication of the relative "youth" of the craters. The smoothness of the Plains also indicates that Charon was not / is a geologically dead body. In box may be that smooth its surface due to cryovolcanism. Perhaps before it existed under the surface of Charon's ice ocean, which is pouring on the surface, updated plains, craters hiding.



All these conjectures can be confirmed or refuted in the near future when New Horizons will send back to Earth even more high-quality images, as well as additional information about Pluto. Now the probe is at a distance of about 5 billion kilometers from Earth, all station systems are functioning normally.





Source: geektimes.ru/post/263524/