Revelling in Pluto’s Etherial Beauty

Pluto
Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI)

Ostensibly we go, or send our machines, out into space for the advancement of science. It is a goal NASA’s New Horizon’s mission to the Pluto – Charon system has clearly achieved and then some. As the quality of imaging systems has vastly improved over earlier missions however, what continues to delight and to invoke wonder is the sheer beauty of the cosmos in all its diversity.

Stuart Robbins, a scientist with the Southwest Research Institute working on the New Horizon’s mission, has created an “aerial tour” of Pluto by stitching together a series of images taken at 400 meters per pixel resolution.

Robbins describes the process in this NASA blog post.