Pluto in True Color
Explanation:
What color is Pluto, really?
It took some effort to figure out.
Even given all of the
images sent back
to Earth when the robotic
New Horizons spacecraft
sped past Pluto in 2015,
processing these
multi-spectral frames to approximate what the
human eye would see was challenging.
The result
featured
here,
released three years after the raw data was acquired by
New Horizons,
is the highest resolution true color image of
Pluto ever taken.
Visible in the image is the light-colored, heart-shaped,
Tombaugh Regio, with the unexpectedly smooth
Sputnik Planitia,
made of frozen
nitrogen,
filling its western lobe.
New Horizons found the dwarf-planet to have a
surprisingly complex surface
composed of many regions having perceptibly different hues.
In total, though, Pluto is
mostly brown, with much of its muted color originating
from small amounts of surface methane energized by
ultraviolet light from the Sun.
Authors & editors:
Robert Nemiroff
(MTU) &
Jerry Bonnell
(USRA)
NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings,
and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris.
Specific
rights apply.
A service of:
LHEA at
NASA /
GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
