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Conference TI - the New Horizons Mission: Pluto and the Kuiper Belt Up-Close AU - Singer, K

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Conference TI - the New Horizons Mission: Pluto and the Kuiper Belt Up-Close AU - Singer, K PT - Conference TI - The New Horizons Mission: Pluto and the Kuiper Belt Up-Close AU - Singer, K. N. AU - Stern, A. AU - Moore, J. M. AU - Spencer, J. R. AU - McKinnon, W. B. AU - White, O. L. AU - Schenk, P. AU - Porter, S. AU - Verbiscer, A. AU - Parker, A. H. AU - Buie, M. W. AU - Showalter, M. AU - Umurhan, O. M. AU - Young, L. A. AU - Binzel, R. P. AU - Grundy, W. M. AU - Protopapa, S. AU - Weaver, H. A., Jr. AU - Olkin, C. AU - Ennico Smith, K. AU - Parker, J. W. TA - AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts SO - American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2019, abstract #P54B-09 VI - 2019 DP - 2019 Dec 01 PG - P54B-09 4099- https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019AGUFM.P54B..09S AB - In July of 2015 the New Horizons spacecraft flew through the Pluto system, initiating humanity's close-up exploration of Kuiper belt objects (Stern et al., 2015, Science). Pluto turned out to be a world of remarkable geologic diversity whose terrains display a range of ages and varied compositions, suggesting geologic activity of various forms (both endogenic and exogenic) has persisted for much of Pluto's history (e.g., Moore et al., 2016, Science). This was a surprise given Pluto's size and lack of recent tidal energy inputs. Many discoveries were also made about Pluto's complex atmosphere, including the existence of many haze layers. Pluto's large moon Charon appears to have had an early large cyrovolcanic resurfacing episode along with large-scale extensional tectonism. On January 1 of 2019 New Horizons encountered its second target, a cold classical Kuiper belt object approximately 35 km across at 43 AU (Stern et al., 2019, Science). This is the farthest and most primordial planetary body ever explored in detail. Its flattened, snowperson-like shape and unique surface features are helping us learn about the earliest times in the solar system and how planetary bodies formed (Spencer et al., 2019, Science; McKinnon et al., 2019, Science). No satellites or rings were found. MU69's surface has the signature of H2O and CH3OH (methanol) and a very red color, indicative of other organics. This presentation will highlight some of the unique aspects of the Pluto-system, and give an update on the ongoing work to further unveil its secrets. We will also present an overview of what New Horizons is learning about the Kuiper belt as a whole (from Pluto to MU69 to distant KBO observations) and what new information this gives us about planetesimal and planet formation. PT - Conference TI - Triton's Surface Composition: Reevaluation of Voyager colors from the perspective of New Horizons at Pluto AU - Schenk, P. AU - Grundy, W. M. AU - Hansen, C. J. AU - Howett, C. AU - Prockter, L. M. TA - AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts SO - American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2019, abstract #P53D-3492 VI - 2019 DP - 2019 Dec 01 PG - P53D-3492 4099- https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019AGUFM.P53D3492S AB - New Horizons mapping of Pluto the best known Kuiper Belt Object (KBO), revealed the presence of surface ices (including CO, CH4, N2, and H2O) and their geologic distribution. Triton, the largest moon of Neptune, is very similar in size and bulk density to Pluto and was likely a KBO before capture. Both bodies orbit at comparable distances from the Sun (though Pluto goes further out) and have similar rotation periods. Both have complex obliquity cycles and both may have been or are ocean worlds. Triton is also a priority target for future exploration. Voyager (VGR) color mapping lacked the infrared capabilities of New Horizons (NH), rendering compositional mapping very difficult, but also revealed complex geologic and atmospheric color patterns on the surface of Triton. These include color changes at unit boundaries and equatorial bright and dark regional patterns uncorrelated to geology with very strong UV signatures. Small dark spots that appear wind-blown also have distinct spectral signatures. We have remapped the color data for Triton using updated cartography. VGR did extend into the UV which allows comparisons to Cassini icy moons color mapping. Color filter bandpasses for VGR & NH overlap in the 0.4 and 0.6 micron bands, which allows for a comparison of the brightness and spectral slopes of color units on the two bodies. The presence of CO2 on Triton will produce a distinct spectral signature compared to Pluto. Principle component analysis will be updated using all 6 filters to identify distinctive surface components. Disk integrated color rotational coverage from Earth-based spectra may also permit correlation of specific color units with identified longitudinal concentrations of ice phases. PT - Conference TI - Pluto Refractory Material AU - Dalle Ore, C. AU - Cruikshank, D. P. AU - Grundy, W. M. AU - Cook, J. C. AU - Ennico Smith, K. AU - Olkin, C. AU - Stern, A. AU - Weaver, H. A., Jr. AU - Young, L. A. TA - AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts SO - American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2019, abstract #P43C-3486 VI - 2019 DP - 2019 Dec 01 PG - P43C-3486 4099- https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019AGUFM.P43C3486D AB - One of Pluto's unexpected discoveries has been the variety of terrains that characterize its surface. This bounty of data has given us the opportunity to investigate the composition of the different regions to compare and contrast the non-icy refractory component(s) of Pluto's surface. The colored materials that are the target of our investigation are thought to originate either from haze deposition, or from ejection from a liquid water sub-crustal reservoir, or from surface irradiation of the hydrocarbon ices. Considering the dynamic nature of Pluto's surface, continually refreshed and/or renewed, the possibility of a primordial component is remote. We compare the refractory material of different regions of Pluto's surface and attempt at identifying their origin. PT - Conference TI - On the solar nebula origin of (486958) 2014 MU69, a primordial contact binary in the Kuiper belt AU - McKinnon, W. B. AU - Grundy, W. M. AU - Hamilton, D. AU - Umurhan, O. M. AU - Keane, J. T. AU - Spencer, J. R. AU - Olkin, C. AU - Weaver, H. A., Jr. AU - Stern, S. A. TA - AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts SO - American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2019, abstract #P42C-05 VI - 2019 DP - 2019 Dec 01 PG - P42C-05 4099- https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019AGUFM.P42C..05M AB - MU69 is a contact binary, and all the data returned from New Horizons are consistent with it being a planetesimal. It is not a product of heliocentric, high-speed collisional evolution. There is no evidence of it having suffered a catastrophic or even a subcatastrophic impact during its lifetime. Nor is there evidence of hierarchical accretion of independent, heliocentric planetesimals, as slow as those collisions may have been in the beginning. Rather, there is strong evidence that its two lobes ("Ultima" and "Thule") came together at an extremely low velocity, on the order of no more than a couple of m/s and possibly much more slowly. Binary formation is a theoretically predicted common outcome in protoplanetary disks when swarms of locally concentrated solids ("pebble clouds") collapse under their own gravity, and plausibly explains the high fraction of binaries among cold classical Kuiper belt objects (KBOs). Cold classical KBO binaries exhibit a range of binary orbital separations, down to the observable limit, so there is no physical reason that tight or even contact binaries could not form in a collapsing pebble cloud. The prominence of bilobate shapes among the short-period comets, which are derived from the scattered disk component of the Kuiper belt, suggests (but does not require) that there is a process that collapses or hardens Kuiper belt binaries. The alignment of the principal axes of the Ultima and Thule lobes is also consistent with tidal coupling between two co-orbiting bodies, prior to a final merger. Our examination of various mechanisms to drive binary mergers in the cold classical Kuiper belt (Kozai-Lidov, BYORP, tides, collisions, gas drag) highlights the potential importance of gas drag while the protosolar nebula is still present. We find the process to be surprisingly effective, because in a gas nebula with a radial pressure gradient the velocity of the gas deviates from the heliocentric Keplerian velocity of the binary. The headwind that the binary feels couples to the motion of the binary pair about its own center of mass. The resulting viscous, Stokes-regime gas drag can collapse MU69-scale co-orbiting binaries—as well as smaller, cometary-scale binaries—within the few-Myr lifetime of the protosolar gas nebula. PT - Conference TI - Surface compositions and colors of Pluto, its system of moons, and 2014 MU69 AU - Protopapa, S. AU - Grundy, W. M. AU - Cruikshank, D. P. AU - Reuter, D. AU - Olkin, C. AU - Ennico Smith, K. AU - Parker, J. W. AU - Singer, K. N. AU - Spencer, J. R. AU - Stern, S. A. AU - Verbiscer, A. AU - Weaver, H. A., Jr. TA - AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts SO - American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2019, abstract #P42C-04 VI - 2019 DP - 2019 Dec 01 PG - P42C-04 4099- https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019AGUFM.P42C..04P AB - The trans-neptunian population is extremely diverse, with bodies ranging from geologically-active, atmosphere-bearing, volatile-dominated dwarf planets to small primitive planetesimals lacking abundant surface volatile ices (e.g., methane, nitrogen, carbon monoxide)---what we think of as the building blocks of planets. Our understanding of the Kuiper Belt has been limited by the challenges of acquiring high-quality spectroscopy for midsize and small trans-neptunian objects and composition maps of large dwarf planets. NASA's New Horizons mission represents a breakthrough in our understanding of the trans-neptunian population providing a detailed portrait of objects with very different size scales: the 2400-km-diameter dwarf planet Pluto, the midsize ~1200 -km-diameter body Charon, and the much smaller Pluto's satellites (e.g., Nix and Hydra) and (486958) 2014 MU69 (hereafter MU69), the latter with an 18 km equivalent spherical diameter.
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