Questions tagged [charon]
Questions regarding Charon, the largest satellite of the dwarf planet Pluto. Often considered to be Pluto's binary.
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What is Charon's ascending node in reference to?
NASA's orbital elements given for Charon's orbit are given at https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?sat_elem. The ascending node is defined as being "measured from the node of the reference plane on the ICRF ...
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What is the centre of rotation of Pluto?
I know that Pluto and Charon have been found to circle round each other, hence the reason Pluto is no longer a planet I believe, which would mean that the centre of rotation is an arbitrary (!) point ...
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What if Earth and Moon revolved around each other like Pluto and Charon?
What would be different for us if Earth and Moon revolved around each other like Pluto and Charon do?
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Can a probe orbit Pluto given Charon's gravity?
Is it possible for a man-made probe to orbit Pluto given its closeness to Charon? The gravitational field interaction of Pluto and Charon is likely to make simple orbit structure difficult for a man-...
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Could Pluto and Charon have extra-Solar origin?
Pluto and Charon seem to have surprisingly young surfaces, considering that resurfacing events were expected to be rare for them.
Could the explanation be that they actually are young? Formed later ...
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What places on Pluto and Charon are facing each other?
What places on Pluto and Charon are facing each other? Are Pluto and Charon perfectly tidally locked, or is there a slow rotation over time? And how long after formation should they have become ...
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Has New Horizon's data updated Charon's orbital elements?
For years I've been fascinated with the mutually tide-locked bodies Pluto and Charon. In July 2012, The Astronomical Journal published an article The Orbit of Charon Is Circular by Buie, Tholen and ...
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Do Pluto and Charon have unusual Lagrange points?
The usual examples of Lagrange points one most commonly encounters, Sun-Earth and Earth-Moon Lagrange points, are examples of 3-body problems where $M_1\gg M_2\gg M_3$. The Pluto-Charon system, ...
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What will New Horizons be able to say about a magnetic field at Pluto?
Does NASA's New Horizons flyby probe to Pluto have instruments to measure Pluto's (or Charon's) magnetic field, if any?
I'm a bit confused by the Wikipedia article which says that New Horizons, ...
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What theories are there in explaining the formation of the Pluto-Charon system?
After reading the question and answer to Effect of Charon on Pluto, a further question is this: how is the Pluto-Charon relationship explained?
Specifically, what theories are there in how did the ...
user8
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Effect of Charon on Pluto
Even though Pluto is not known as a planet anymore, theroetically it has/had a moon, called Charon. I've heard about something that their size are so close to each other that while Charon rotates ...
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