Pluto is the smallest planet in the Solar System, smaller than Earths Moon, and half the

width of Jupiters moon, Ganymede. Plutos journey around the Sun takes 248 Earth years. This
means that, since its discovery in 1930, it still has 177 years to go until it has made a complete
orbit around the Sun. Nobody knows what Plutos atmosphere contains, or even if it has an
atmosphere. Pluto was the only planet to have been discovered in the Twentieth Century. Pluto
is the only planet in the Solar System that has not yet been visited by a space probe. Pluto orbits
the Sun on a different plain than the other 8 planets, going over them and below them.
Pluto has three identified moons, Charon, the largest is not much bigger than Pluto itself.
(Pluto is 2,280 kilometers wide, Charon is 1,212 kilometers wide). A day on Pluto is equivalent
to Earths 6 days and 9 hours, meaning that it has the second slowest rotation in the Solar System
(after Venus, which takes 243 days to turn on its axis). Plutos orbit is elliptical, meaning that it
can come closer to the Sun than Neptune, but then go almost two billion kilometers further away
from Neptunes orbit. Pluto is too faint to be seen with the naked eye. When viewed through a
telescope, it looks like a star.
Pluto is cold: -233 C (-390 F), just 40 C (72 F) above absolute zero. At this
temperature, all elements would be frozen except for neon, hydrogen, and helium. Pluto
maximum distance from the Sun 7.38 billion km (4.6 billion miles). Plutos minimum distance
from Earth 4.28 billion km (2.7 billion miles). In 2006, Pluto was declassified as a planet by
the IAU (International Astronomical Union) and has classified Pluto as a dwarf planet. If you
weigh 100 lbs, your weight on Pluto would be 7 lbs. (multiply your actual weight by .05)
Pluto, formal designation 134340 Pluto, is the second-most-massive known dwarf
planet in the Solar System (after Eris) and the tenth-most-massive body observed directly
orbiting the Sun. Originally classified as the ninth planet from the Sun, Pluto was recategorized
as a dwarf planet and plutoid due to the discovery that it is one of several large bodies within the
newly charted Kuiper belt.[i]
Like other members of the Kuiper belt, Pluto is composed primarily of rock and ice and is
relatively small: approximately a fifth the mass of the Earth's Moonand a third its volume. It has
an eccentric and highly inclined orbit that takes it from 30 to 49 AU (4.47.4 billion km) from

the Sun. This causes Pluto to periodically come closer to the Sun than Neptune. As of 2011, it is
32.1 AU from the Sun.[12]
From its discovery in 1930 until 2006, Pluto was classified as a planet. In the late 1970s,
following the discovery of minor planet 2060 Chiron in the outer Solar System and the
recognition of Pluto's relatively low mass, its status as a major planet began to be
questioned.[13] In the late 20th and early 21st century, many objects similar to Pluto were
discovered in the outer Solar System, notably the scattered disc object Eris in 2005, which is
27% more massive than Pluto.[14] On August 24, 2006, the International Astronomical
Union (IAU) defined what it means to be a "planet" within the Solar System. This definition
excluded Pluto as a planet and added it as a member of the new category "dwarf planet" along
with Eris and Ceres.[15] After the reclassification, Pluto was added to the list of minor planets and
given the number 134340.[16][17] A number of scientists hold that Pluto should continue to be
classified as a planet, and that other dwarf planets should be added to the roster of planets along
with Pluto.[18][19]
Pluto has four known moons, the largest being Charon discovered in 1978, along
with Nix and Hydra, discovered in 2005,[20] and the provisionally namedS/2011 P 1, discovered
in 2011.[21] Pluto and Charon are sometimes described as a binary system because
the barycenter of their orbits does not lie within either body.[22] However, the IAU has yet to
formalise a definition for binary dwarf planets, and as such Charon is officially classified as
a moon of Pluto.
Capping years of intense debate, astronomers resolved Thursday to demote Pluto in a wholesale
redefinition of planethood that is being billed as a victory of scientific reasoning over historic
and cultural influences. But the decision is already being hotly debated.
Officially, Pluto is no longer a planet.
"Pluto is dead," said Mike Brown, a planetary scientist at the California Institute of Technology
who spoke with reporters via a teleconference while monitoring the vote. The decision also
means a Pluto-sized object that Brown discovered will not be called a planet.
"Pluto is not a planet," Brown said. "There are finally, officially, eight planets in the solar
system."

The vote involved just 424 astronomers who remained for the last day of a meeting of the
International Astronomical Union in Prague.
"I'm embarrassed for astronomy. Less than 5 percent of the world's astronomers voted," said
Alan Stern, leader of NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto and a scientist at the Southwest
Research Institute.
"This definition stinks, for technical reasons," Stern told Space.com. He expects the astronomy
community to overturn the decision. Other astronomers criticized the definition as ambiguous.
The resolution
The decision establishes three main categories of objects in our solar system.

Planets: The eight worlds starting with Mercury and moving out to Venus, Earth,
Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.

Dwarf planets: Pluto and any other round object that "has not cleared the
neighborhood around its orbit, and is not a satellite."

Small solar system bodies: All other objects orbiting the sun.

Pluto and its moon Charon, which would both have been planets under the initial definition
proposed Aug. 16, now get demoted because they are part of a sea of other objects that occupy
the same region of space. Earth and the other eight large planets have, on the other hand, cleared
broad swaths of space of any other large objects.
"Pluto is a dwarf planet by the ... definition and is recognized as the prototype of a new category
of trans-Neptunian objects," states the approved resolution.
Dwarf planets are not planets under the definition, however.
"There will be hundreds of dwarf planets," Brown predicted. He has already found dozens that fit
the category.
Contentious logic
The vote came after eight days of contentious debate that involved four separate proposals at the
group's meeting in Prague.
The initial proposal, hammered out by a group of seven astronomers, historians and authors,
attempted to preserve Pluto as a planet but was widely criticized for diluting the meaning of the
word. It would also have made planets out of the asteroid Ceres and Pluto's moon Charon. But
not now.

"Ceres is a dwarf planet. it's the only dwarf planet in the asteroid belt," Brown said. "Charon is a
satellite."
The category of "dwarf planet" is expected to include dozens of round objects already discovered
beyond Neptune. Ultimately, hundreds will probably be found, astronomers say.
The word "planet" originally described wanderers of the sky that moved against the relatively
fixed background of star. Pluto, discovered in 1930, was at first thought to be larger than it is. It
has an eccentric orbit that crosses the path of Neptune and also takes it well above and below the
main plane of the solar system.
Recent discoveries of other round, icy object in Pluto's realm have led most astronomers to agree
that the diminutive world should never have been termed a planet.
'A farce'
Stern, in charge of the robotic probe on its way to Pluto, said the language of the resolution is
flawed. It requires that a planet "has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit." But Earth, Mars,
Jupiter and Neptune all have asteroids as neighbors.
"It's patently clear that Earth's zone is not cleared," Stern told Space.com. "Jupiter has 50,000
Trojan asteroids," which orbit in lockstep with the planet.
Stern called it "absurd" that only 424 astronomers were allowed to vote, out of about 10,000
professional astronomers around the globe.
"It won't stand," he said. "It's a farce."
Stern said astronomers are already circulating a petition that would try to overturn the IAU
decision.
Owen Gingerich, historian and astronomer emeritus at Harvard who led the committee that
proposed the initial definition, called the new definition "confusing and unfortunate" and said he
was "not at all pleased" with the language about clearing the neighborhood.
Gingerich also did not like the term "dwarf" planet.
"I thought that it made a curious linguistic contradiction," Gingerich said during a telephone
interview from Boston (where he could not vote). "A dwarf planet is not a planet. I thought that
was very awkward."
Gingerich added: "In the future, one would hope the IAU could do electronic balloting."