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New Horizons: Encountering Pluto and KBOs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 April 2010

Leslie A. Young
Affiliation:
Southwest Research Institute, 1050 Walnut St., Suite 300, Boulder CO 80302 email: layoung@boulder.swri.edu
S. Alan Stern
Affiliation:
Southwest Research Institute, 1050 Walnut St., Suite 300, Boulder CO 80302 email: alan@boulder.swri.edu
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Abstract

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New Horizons is a NASA mission to explore the Pluto system and the Kuiper Belt. The spacecraft was launched on 19 January 2006 and will begin its encounter studies of Pluto in early 2015, culminating on 14 July 2015 with a close approach just 12,500 km from Pluto. The spacecraft carries panchromatic and color images, IR and UV mapping spectrometers, a radio science package, two in situ plasma instruments, and a dust counter. We describe the capabilities of this instrument suite and the spacecraft, the observations planned for Pluto and its system of satellites, and our plans for KBO flybys to take place late in the 2010s.

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Type
Contributed Papers
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2010