New Horizons is a NASA space probe launched to study
the dwarf planet Pluto (still considered a planet at time of launch), its moons
and one or two Kuiper belt objects, depending on which are in position to be
explored. Part of the New Frontiers program, the mission was approved in 2001
after cancellation of Pluto Fast Flyby
and Pluto Kuiper Express. The mission
profile was proposed by a team led by principal investigator Alan Stern of
Southwest Research Institute. After several delays on the launch site, New
Horizons was launched on 19 January 2006 from Cape
Canaveral , directly into an Earth-and-solar-escape-trajectory with
an Earth-relative speed of about 16.26 kilometers per second (58,536 km/h;
36,373 mph); it set the record for the highest launch speed of a human-made object
from Earth. New Horizons should perform a flyby of the Pluto system on
14 July 2015.
After a brief encounter with asteroid 132524 APL, New Horizons proceeded to Jupiter, making its closest approach on 28 February 2007 at a distance of 2.3 million kilometers (1.4 million miles). The Jupiter flyby provided a gravity assist that increased New Horizons' speed by 4 km/s (14,000 km/h; 9,000 mph). The encounter was also used as a general test of New Horizons' scientific capabilities, returning data about the planet's atmosphere, moons and magnetosphere. After Jupiter, the probe continued toward Pluto. Much of the post-Jupiter voyage has been spent in hibernation mode to preserve onboard systems. New Horizons photographed Pluto for the first time in September 2006, followed by an image that distinguished Pluto and its moon Charon as two separate objects in July 2013. Radio signals take more than 4 hours to travel to the spacecraft from Earth.
Background
New Horizons is the first mission in NASA's New Frontiers mission category, larger and more expensive than Discovery missions but smaller than the Flagship Program. The cost of the mission (including spacecraft and instrument development, launch vehicle, mission operations, data analysis, and education/public outreach) is approximately $650 million over 15 years (2001–2016). An earlier proposed Pluto mission—Pluto Kuiper Express—was cancelled by NASA in 2000 for budgetary reasons. Further information relating to an overview with historical context can be found at the IEEE website and gives further background and details, with more details regarding the Jupiter fly-by. After a three month concept study, NASA announced on 8 June 2001 that of the two competing design proposals, New Horizons and POSSE (Pluto and Outer Solar System Explorer), New Horizons will proceed with preliminary design studies for a Pluto flyby mission.
The spacecraft was built primarily by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. The mission's principal investigator is Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute (formerly NASA Associate Administrator).
Overall control after separation from the launch vehicle is performed at Mission Operations Center (MOC) at the Applied Physics Laboratory. The science instruments are operated atClyde Tombaugh
Science Operations
Center (T-SOC) in Boulder , Colorado
New Horizons was originally planned as a voyage to the only unexplored planet in the Solar System. When the spacecraft was launched, Pluto was still classified as a planet, later to be reclassified as a dwarf planet by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Some members of the New Horizons team, including Alan Stern, disagree with the IAU definition and still describe Pluto as the ninth planet. Pluto's satellites Nix and Hydra also have a connection with the spacecraft: the first letters of their names (N and H) are the initials of New Horizons. The moons' discoverers chose these names for this reason, plus Nix and Hydra's relationship to the mythological Pluto.
In addition to the science equipment, there are several cultural artifacts traveling with the spacecraft. These include a collection of 434,738 names stored on a compact disc, a piece of Scaled Composites SpaceShipOne, and a flag of theUSA
About an ounce ofClyde Tombaugh’s ashes are aboard the spacecraft, to
commemorate his discovery of Pluto in 1930. A Florida-state quarter coin, whose
design commemorates human exploration, is included, officially as a trim
weight. One of the science packages (a dust counter) is named after Venetia
Burney, who, as a child, suggested the name "Pluto" after the
planet's discovery.
After a brief encounter with asteroid 132524 APL, New Horizons proceeded to Jupiter, making its closest approach on 28 February 2007 at a distance of 2.3 million kilometers (1.4 million miles). The Jupiter flyby provided a gravity assist that increased New Horizons' speed by 4 km/s (14,000 km/h; 9,000 mph). The encounter was also used as a general test of New Horizons' scientific capabilities, returning data about the planet's atmosphere, moons and magnetosphere. After Jupiter, the probe continued toward Pluto. Much of the post-Jupiter voyage has been spent in hibernation mode to preserve onboard systems. New Horizons photographed Pluto for the first time in September 2006, followed by an image that distinguished Pluto and its moon Charon as two separate objects in July 2013. Radio signals take more than 4 hours to travel to the spacecraft from Earth.
Background
New Horizons is the first mission in NASA's New Frontiers mission category, larger and more expensive than Discovery missions but smaller than the Flagship Program. The cost of the mission (including spacecraft and instrument development, launch vehicle, mission operations, data analysis, and education/public outreach) is approximately $650 million over 15 years (2001–2016). An earlier proposed Pluto mission—Pluto Kuiper Express—was cancelled by NASA in 2000 for budgetary reasons. Further information relating to an overview with historical context can be found at the IEEE website and gives further background and details, with more details regarding the Jupiter fly-by. After a three month concept study, NASA announced on 8 June 2001 that of the two competing design proposals, New Horizons and POSSE (Pluto and Outer Solar System Explorer), New Horizons will proceed with preliminary design studies for a Pluto flyby mission.
The spacecraft was built primarily by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. The mission's principal investigator is Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute (formerly NASA Associate Administrator).
Overall control after separation from the launch vehicle is performed at Mission Operations Center (MOC) at the Applied Physics Laboratory. The science instruments are operated at
New Horizons was originally planned as a voyage to the only unexplored planet in the Solar System. When the spacecraft was launched, Pluto was still classified as a planet, later to be reclassified as a dwarf planet by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Some members of the New Horizons team, including Alan Stern, disagree with the IAU definition and still describe Pluto as the ninth planet. Pluto's satellites Nix and Hydra also have a connection with the spacecraft: the first letters of their names (N and H) are the initials of New Horizons. The moons' discoverers chose these names for this reason, plus Nix and Hydra's relationship to the mythological Pluto.
In addition to the science equipment, there are several cultural artifacts traveling with the spacecraft. These include a collection of 434,738 names stored on a compact disc, a piece of Scaled Composites SpaceShipOne, and a flag of the
About an ounce of
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