Does Pluto Have Rings ?

Listening to the Planetary Radio podcast about the New Horizons mission from NASA to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt and heard the principle investigator, Alan Stern say that they were hoping to find that Pluto had a ring system!

This is likely because its three moons (Charon and the two unnamed ones discovered earlier this year) have such low gravity that there’s a good chance that meteorite impacts would throw up dust that would escape the moons could end up in orbit around Pluto.

7 thoughts on “Does Pluto Have Rings ?

  1. Unfortunately to find out you’re going to have to wait until either New Horizons gets there or someone gets a much more powerful telescope looking at Pluto..

    Can’t blame me for that!

  2. Hi Jen, your best bet is to keep a close eye on the New Horizons mission web site around July 2015 (sadly I am not joking) when the spacecraft does its pass of Pluto.

    In the meantime the Planetary Society has a very good page on Pluto that they keep up to date with discoveries and their own blog is well worth following for space news.

    Given that Pluto is so far away it’s a bit hard for scientists to get good observations until New Horizons gets there!

  3. you guys are no help and should all go die. im 13 and doing a science report on Pluto! Noone has ever been there so we all dont know, its hard to write about! so if you dont have any info on it why bother putting anything on this stupid site! ahh! pluto might have rings.. scientists say that it might have A ring on its left upright corner..!

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