2024-04-21 18:44:39
An international team of astrophysicists has made major progress in understanding the heart-shaped shape on Pluto’s surface, known informally as “Tombo Reggio.”
According to the magazine “Nature Astronomy”, the “New Horizons” probe of the American space agency “NASA” photographed this ice formation in 2015, and scientists are trying to decipher how this unique structure was formed.
After years of intense research, an international team of astrophysicists has revealed the most likely explanation for its mysterious formation: an ancient collision.
In Pluto’s early years, an object regarding 400 miles (nearly 700 kilometers) across struck it at an unusual angle, creating this surface feature. The study was led by the University of Bern and members of the National Center for Planetary Research (NCCR), including the University of Arizona in Tucson.
The unique geological formation consists of two parts: the bright, heart-shaped “Sputnik Planitia” and the dark surrounding “Cthulhu Makola”.
“Sputnik Planitia” represents a frozen plain with an area of 1,000 km and is located in the western part of “Tombo Reggio”.
This immense area is equivalent to a quarter of the area of Europe or the United States.
To recreate this strange heart-shaped feature, the researchers used computer simulations using the Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) program. They discovered a series of simulations that produced a close match, showing that the surface feature resulted from “the effect of a giant, slow oblique angle.”
Martin Goetze from the University of Bern said: The elongated shape of Sputnik Planitia clearly indicates that the collision was not a direct collision, but rather an oblique collision.
Research indicates that the region was affected by its collision with a planetary body with a diameter of regarding 700 km during Pluto’s early years.
The research team attributed Sputnik Planitia’s shiny appearance to the fact that it is mostly filled with white nitrogen ice that moves and transmits convection to constantly smooth the surface on its sides. Harry Ballantyne, the lead author from the University of Bern, explained that. this nitrogen likely accumulated quickly following the collision due to the low altitude.
The new simulations provided new information regarding Pluto’s internal structure, contradicting previous ideas. Additionally, research indicates that Pluto does not contain a subterranean ocean, contrary to previous hypotheses.
According to previous scientific theories, Pluto, like other planetary bodies in the outer solar system, may contain an ocean of liquid water beneath its surface.
The core’s unusual location near the planet’s equator has led scientists to speculate that this might be due to liquid water beneath the region.
The new research indicates that a liquid ocean is not necessary to explain the position of Pluto’s core, Goetzi said.
However, scientists suggest an alternative explanation: In our simulations, Pluto’s primitive mantle was completely hollowed out by the impact, and because the core material of the impacting body was scattered across Pluto’s core, this created a local excess that might explain the migration towards the equator. without an underground ocean, or often very thin environment.
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