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Birthday · July 16, 2012

Fifth Moon Discovered Orbiting Pluto

July 16, 2012

The same gravity that holds galaxies together and keeps planets in their orbits also held you to the Earth on the day you were born.

Fifth Moon Discovered Orbiting Pluto

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APOD published July 16, 2012. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.

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Fifth Moon Discovered Orbiting Pluto

Original APOD · July 16, 2012

A fifth moon has been discovered orbiting Pluto. The moon was discovered earlier this month in images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in preparation for the New Horizons mission's scheduled flyby of Pluto in 2015. Pictured above, the moon is currently seen as only a small blip that moves around the dwarf planet as the entire system slowly orbits the Sun. The moon, given a temporary designation of S/2012 (134340) 1 or just P5 (as labeled), is estimated to span about 15 kilometers and is likely composed mostly of water-ice. Pluto remains the only famous Solar System body never visited by a human-built probe and so its origins and detailed appearance remain mostly unknown.

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