Pluto

Millie Elizabeth Hughes

Fulford is an American medical investigator and molecular biologist who flew aboard a NASA Space Shuttle mission as a Payload Specialist.

Hughes-Fulford was born December 21, 1945, in Mineral Wells, Texas. She graduated from Mineral Wells High School, in 1962, then received her Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry and Biology from Tarleton State University in 1968, and her Ph.D. from Texas Woman's University in 1972.

She is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Society for Gravitational Science and Biology, American Society for Bone and Mineral Research, American Society for Cell Biology and the Association of Space Explorers.

Hughes-Fulford entered college at the age of 16 and earned her B.Sc. degree in chemistry and biology from Tarleton State University in 1968.

Liu Yang

First chainese woman in space.

(Born October 6, 1978) is a Chinese pilot and astronaut who served as a crew member on the space mission Shenzhou 9.^] On 16 June 2012, Liu became the first Chinese woman in space.Liu was born in Zhengzhou, Henan in 1978,into a family of Linzhou, Anyang origin. She graduated from People's Liberation Army Air Force Aviation College of Changchun.

Liu joined the People's Liberation Army Air Force in 1997 and qualified as a pilot before becoming the deputy head of a flight unit, holding the PLAAF rank of major. She is a veteran pilot with 1,680 hours of flying experience. After two years of astronaut training, Liu excelled in testing before being selected with another woman, Wang Yaping, as a candidate for the astronaut corps.

Liu was selected for the crew of Shenzhou 9, the first manned mission to the Chinese space station Tiangong 1, along with Jing Haipeng, the first repeat Chinese space traveller, and Liu Wang. Liu became the first female Chinese astronaut to go into space. The mission was launched on 16 June 2012, 49 years to the day after the first female space traveller, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova was launched.

Arne Christer Fuglesang

First Swedish citizen in space

(Born March 18, 1957 in Stockholm) is a Swedish physicist and an ESA astronaut. He was first launched aboard the STS-116 Space Shuttle mission on December 10, 2006, at 01:47 GMT, making him the first Swedish citizen in space.Married with three children, he was a Fellow at CERN and taught mathematics at the Royal Institute of Technology before being selected to join the European Astronaut Corps 1992. He has participated in two Space Shuttle missions and five spacewalks, and is the first person outside of the United States or Russian space programs to participate in more than three spacewalks.Fuglesang graduated from the Bromma Gymnasium, Stockholm in 1975, earned a Master of Science degree in engineering physics from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), in Stockholm in 1981, and received a doctorate in experimental particle physics from Stockholm University in 1987. He became an associate professor (docent) of particle physics at Stockholm

University

In May 1992, Fuglesang was selected to join the European Astronaut Corps of the European Space Agency (ESA) based at the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) in Cologne, Germany.

Franco Egidio Malerba (Ph.D.)

First Italian in space .

(born October 10, 1946, in Busalla, Genoa, Italy) is an Italian astronaut. He was the first citizen of Italy to travel to space.

Married to the former Marie-Aude Némo. They have one child. Recreational interests include mountaineering, skiing, and tennis. He is fluent in Italian, English, and French..
1965 Maturità classica (Lyceum).
1970 University degree, Electronics Engineer, University of Genoa, Italy, specializing in the telecommunications field (laurea 110/110 cum Laude). 1974 Doctorate in Physics, University of Genoa, (110/110) specializing in Biophysics (after research work at the Italian National Research Council (CNR) and at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA). After selection in 1989 as a Payload Specialist by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and NASA, he became a staff member of ASI and was assigned to the NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas, for training. In September 1991, he was designated Prime Payload Specialist for the TSS-1 Space Shuttle mission. Malerba flew as the first Italian citizen in space on STS-46 (July 31, 1992 to August 7, 1992). He is now involved with the Italian Space Agency (ASI) manned space flight program follow-on activities.

PLUTO

Our favorite dwarf planet since 2006. Pluto is the largest object in the Kuiper belt, and the tenth-most-massive body observed directly orbiting the Sun. It is the second-most-massive known dwarf planet, after Eris.

Discovered by : Clyde W. Tombaugh

Discovery date :February 18, 1930

Gravity: 0.658 m/s²

Density: 2.03 g/cm³

Average Distance from the Sun km / miles / A.U.: 149,597,890 km / 92,955,820 miles / 1.000 A.U.

Mean radius : 1184±10 km[7]

Surface area :1.665×107 km2[c]0.033 Earths

Volume : 6.39×109 km3[d]0.0059 Earths

Mass : (1.305±0.007)×1022 kg[9]0.00218 Earths

Mean density : 2.03±0.06 g/cm3[9]

Surface gravity :0.658 m/s2[e]0.067 g

Escape velocity : 1.229 km/s

Surfacetemp. min mean max
Kelvin 33 K 44 K (-229 °C) 55 K

Surface pressure : 0.30 Pa (summer maximum)

Composition :nitrogen, methane, carbon monoxide[14]

Pluto's orbital period is 248 Earth years

Orbits: Sun

Discoverer: Clyde Tombaugh

Moons: Charon, Styx, Kerberos, Nix, Hydra

How its got name 'Pluto' ?

There are currently five worlds orbiting the Sun which are known as Dwarf Planets: Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake and Eris. Ceres is the closest Dwarf Planet to the Sun and Earth, orbiting in the Asteroid Belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Perhaps the most famous of the Dwarf Planets is Pluto, which was discovered in 1930 and was classed as a planet until 2006. Eris, discovered in 2005 is the largest of the Dwarf Planets. Pluto, Haumea, Makemake and Eris are usually located beyond the orbit of Neptune in an area called the Kuiper Belt. They may also be known as Trans-Neptunian Objects (TNO), Kuiper Belt Objects (KPO) or Plutoids!

The discovery made headlines across the globe. The Lowell Observatory, which had the right to name the new object, received over 1,000 suggestions from all over the world, ranging from Atlas to Zymal. Tombaugh urged Slipher to suggest a name for the new object quickly before someone else did. Constance Lowell proposed Zeus, then Percival and finally Constance. These suggestions were disregarded.

The name Pluto, after the god of the underworld, was proposed by Venetia Burney (1918–2009), an eleven-year-old schoolgirl in Oxford, England, who was interested in classical mythology. She suggested it in a conversation with her grandfather Falconer Madan, a former librarian at the University of Oxford's Bodleian Library, who passed the name to astronomy professor Herbert Hall Turner, who cabled it to colleagues in the United States.]

The object was officially named on March 24, 1930.Each member of the Lowell Observatory was allowed to vote on a short-list of three: Minerva (which was already the name for an asteroid), Cronus (which had lost reputation through being proposed by the unpopular astronomer Thomas Jefferson Jackson See), and Pluto. Pluto received every vote. The name was announced on May 1, 1930. Upon the announcement, Madan gave Venetia GB£5 (£268 as of 2014), as a reward.

Moons of Pluto :

They are Charon (discovered in 1978,), Hydra and Nix (both discovered in 2005), Kerberos originally P4 (discovered 2011) and Styx originally P5 (discovered 2012) official designations S/2011 (134340) 1 and S/2012 (134340) .

Mission on pluto

1]New Horizons was a space craft that launched in 2006. Its mission is to visit Pluto and its moons. When it was launched, Pluto was still recognised as a planet and was the only one not to have been visited by a space probe. Pluto lost its status as a planet in summer 2006, so New Horizons can no longer be recognised as the mission to visit the last planet in the solar system. The mission to be credited with that is Voyager, as Voyager 2 reached Neptune in 1989.

Interesting facts about pluto

1] Pluto is the planet with the lowest pull of gravity in the Solar System. This will explain why its moon, Charon, orbits the planet so closely (at a distance of 19,640 kilometres).

2] All of All dwarf planets are smaller than all of the regular planets in the Solar System. The most famous dwarf planet, Pluto, is smaller than Earth's Moon, and half the width of Jupiter's moon, Ganymede.

3] Dwarf planets orbit on a different plain than the other 8 planets, going over them and below them.

4] A day on Pluto lasts for 6 days and 9 hours, on Eris for 8 hours, on Ceres for 9 hours, 5 minutes and on Haumea for 4 hours.

5] Pluto's journey around the Sun takes 248 Earth years. Eris' journey takes 557 years. Pluto was discovered in 1930 which means that it won't be until 2117 until it has made a complete orbit of the Sun. Eris, discovered in 2005, will make a complete orbit of the Sun in 2562 .

6] One of Pluto's moons, Charon, is not much smaller than Pluto itself. No other moon is as close to the size of its planet as Charon is to Pluto. (Pluto is 2,280 kilometres wide, Charon is 1,212 kilometres wide).

7] Pluto's moon, Nix, is named after the Greek goddess of darkness and night. But, in Greek mythology, her name is spelled "Nyx". To avoid getting the moon confused with an asteroid which has already been called Nyx, and because they couldn't be bothered to think of another name, the International Astronomy Union (the people that give planets and moons names) changed the spelling to "Nix", taking the Egyptian spelling of the name.

8] The orbits of dwarf planets are elliptical, meaning that they are more oval than round. Pluto can sometime come closer to the Sun than Neptune, but then go almost two billion kilometres further away from Neptune's orbit. In the picture below, you can see Pluto's orbit (in grey) and Neptune's orbit (in blue).