NASA unveil new Pluto photos from New Horizons

The New Horizons spacecraft just keeps on giving, providing us with this new photo of a close up near to Pluto’s equator. This is the first ever close up image of Pluto’s surface, and details a young, icy mountain range but surprisingly no impact craters.

Pluto has been found to be about 2.370 kilometres (1,473 miles) in diameter, making it somewhat larger than previous estimates of the dwarf planet. Images taken by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI), confirms what astronomers already suspected: the dwarf planet is larger than all other known Solar System objects beyond the orbit of ice giant Neptune.

This close up photo near Pluto’s equator shows a surprising set of youthful mountains.

The first high-resolution images of Pluto’s moon, Charon, also were of interest showing cliffs that run for hundreds of miles across and canyons four to six miles deep.

A deep canyon between 4 and 6 miles deep can be seen on Charon, which scientists believe could be a result of an internal process.

Check out our latest video where our very own Editor Jodie Tyley interviewed Gemma Lavender, owner of a Master’s degree in Astrophysics and Features Editor for All About Space magazine, to find out more about New Horizon’s discoveries…

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Plus, check out:

Pluto: What we know about the dwarf planet so far

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft given “all clear” for Pluto flyby

Why is Pluto no longer a planet?