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New Horizons Sees Pluto
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Caption:
The Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) on New Horizons acquired images of the Pluto field three days apart in late September 2006, in order to see Pluto's motion against a dense background of stars. LORRI took three frames at 1-second exposures on both Sept. 21 and Sept. 24. Because it moved along its predicted path, Pluto was detected in all six images.
These images are displayed using false-color to represent different intensities: the lowest intensity level is black, different shades of red mark intermediate intensities, and the highest intensity is white.
The images appear pixilated because they were obtained in a mode that compensates for the drift in spacecraft pointing over long exposure times. LORRI also made these observations before operators uploaded new flight-control software in October; the upgraded software package includes an optical navigation capability that will make LORRI approximately three times more sensitive still than for these Pluto observations.
Cataloging Keywords:
| Name | Value | Additional Values |
|---|---|---|
| Target | Pluto | |
| System | Pluto | Kuiper Belt |
| Target Type | Dwarf Planet | KBO |
| Mission | New Horizons | |
| Instrument Host | New Horizons | |
| Host Type | Flyby Spacecraft | |
| Instrument | Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) | |
| Detector | ||
| Extra Keywords | Color, Movie, Visual | |
| Acquisition Date | ||
| Release Date | 2007-04-02 | |
| Date in Caption | ||
| Image Credit | NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute | |
| Source | photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA09234 | |
| Identifier | PIA09234 | |
