Ice Volcanoes May Erupt Ammonia, Methane, Nitrogen or Water on Pluto

Summary: Pluto's ice volcanoes may erupt ammonia, methane, nitrogen or water, according to images at AAS Division for Planetary Sciences' 47th annual meeting.

Backlit by the sun, icy geysers erupt for south polar region of Saturn moon Enceladus; Pluto shares the phenomenon of icy spewings: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute, Public Domain, via NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Two large-size, low-profile, warrior’s shield-like cryovolcanoes are among the latest possible discoveries during the New Horizons interplanetary space probe’s reconnaissance flyby of Pluto in July 2015.

The mission team members based theorized existence of Pluto’s ice volcanoes upon images shared with colleagues at the 47th annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences at Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center of National Harbor, Maryland, during the plenary session Nov. 9, 2015.

Astrophysicists call volcanoes that erupt ammonia, methane, nitrogen or water plumes or vapors, not molten rock, on low-temperature interplanetary natural satellites and Kuiper belt objects cryovolcanoes or ice volcanoes.

The New Horizons mission team dubbed the duo Picard Mons and Wright Mons.

The less photogenic 6-kilometer- (3.73-mile-) high Picard Mountain and the more visible, 3.5-kilometer- (2.17-mile-) high Wright Mountain emerge on images taken 18,000 kilometers (11,184.68 miles) from Pluto’s equatorial, smooth Sputnik Planum and rugged, towering mountains on July 14, 2015. Hummock-like, sideways-pressured mounds flank the two 160-kilometer- (99.42-mile-) wide mountains’ circular shapes, cratered summits, and depressed and pitted centers.

"The New Horizons mission has taken what we thought we knew about Pluto and turned it upside down," says Jim Green, director of planetary science at NASA Headquarters in Washington -- Wright Mons and Piccard Mons in 3-D topographic, color-coded map based on New Horizons' data; blue=lower elevation, green=intermediate, brown=high: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI, Public Domain, via NASA

Oliver White, postdoctoral researcher at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, generalizes that “These are big mountains with a large hole in their summit, and on Earth that generally means one thing -- a volcano. If they are volcanic, then the summit depression would likely have formed via collapse as material is erupted from underneath.”

South polar volcanic presences hint at geological processes and young surfaces. An internal heat source is needed to fuel such geological processes as glacier flows and surface volcanism.

Earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences department professor Jay Melosh and graduate student Alex Trowbridge of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, judge a subsurface ammonia-water slurry mantle supportive of rising hot and sinking cold materials.

New Horizons mission team members also keep under consideration the progressive cooling of a rocky core from its formative, original heat and the radioactive decay of elements surviving the solar system’s birth 4.5 billion years ago.

Any one of the trio lets subsurface and surface ice flow and projects subsurface slush through icy surfaces.

Cryovolcanism may represent ground-fissure, south-polar spewings on Enceladus, Saturn’s 14th farthest moon, and non-volcanic tectonics on Ganymede, Jupiter’s seventh farthest moon. Titan, Saturn’s sixth farthest moon, needs second opinions on its radar-indicated cryovolcanism. Triton, Neptune’s eighth farthest moon, offers frictional heat from its host’s gravitational pull.

Reddish-brown Pluto provides unique evocations of cryovolcanic chains beyond its day-night borders and of Mauna Loa on Hawaii and Olympus Mons on Mars.

Professor Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator, quipped: “It’s just astounding that in all of the exploration that we have done, that the nearest neighbor analogy to these constructs occurs on Mars. You have to look all the way to the ‘other Red Planet’ to find something similar.”

False color image of Pluto by New Horizons scientists uses principal component analysis technique to highlight many subtle color differences of Pluto’s distinct regions; image data collected by News Horizons’ Ralph/MVIC color camera July 14, 2015, at 11:11 a.m. UTC from range of 22,000 miles (35,000 kilometers); image presented Nov. 9, 2015, by Will Grundy, News Horizons’ surface composition team, at Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) meeting of American Astronomical Society: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI, Public Domain, via NASA

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Enceladus ice volcanoes: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute, Public Domain, via NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory @ http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA07759

Wright Mons and Piccard Mons: JHUAPL @ NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute, Public Domain, via The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Pluto Mission @ http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/Multimedia/Science-Photos/image.php?page=&gallery_id=2&image_id=375

psychedelic Pluto: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI, Public Domain, via NASA @ https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/psychedelic-pluto

For further information:

"47th Annual DPS Meeting Abstracts." 2015. American Astronomical Society > Resources.
Available @ https://aas.org/files/resources/dps_47_2015_dc_abstracts.pdf

"47th DPS Meeting Science Schedule and Events." 2015. American Astronomical Society > Meetings > DPS47.
Available @ https://aas.org/meetings/dps47/schedule_events

Amos, Jonathan. 9 November 2015. "New Horizons: Pluto May Have Ice Volcanoes." BBC News > Science & Environment.
Available @ http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-34771168

Brown, Dwayne, and Laurie Cantillo. 9 November 2015. "At Pluto, New Horizons Finds Geology of All Ages, Possible Ice Volcanoes, Insights Into Planetary Origins." The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Pluto Mission News Center.
Available @ http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/News-Center/News-Article.php?page=20151109

Hazen, Shelley. 10 November 2015. "Pluto's Radioactive Volcanoes Spewed Icy Slurry - Mystery Mountains Are 'Definitely Weird.'" Inquisitr.
Available @ http://www.inquisitr.com/2555659/plutos-radioactive-volcanoes-spewed-icy-slurry-mystery-mountains-are-definitely-weird/

Malicdem, Darwin. 11 November 2015. "New Horizons Spots 'Ice Volcanoes' That May Erupt Icy Substances on Pluto." International Business Times > Life > Environment & Science.
Available @ http://www.ibtimes.com.au/new-horizons-spots-ice-volcanoes-may-erupt-icy-substances-pluto-1482240

Redd, Nola Taylor. 9 November 2015. "Icy Volcanoes May Erupt on Pluto." Space.com > Science & Astronomy.
Available @ http://www.space.com/31073-pluto-ice-volcano-mountains-photos.html

Talbert, Tricia, ed. 12 November 2015. "Psychedelic Pluto." NASA > Image Feature > New Horizons.
Available @ https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/psychedelic-pluto

Witze, Alexandra. 9 November 2015. "Icy Volcanoes May Dot Pluto's Surface." Nature > News.
Available @ http://www.nature.com/news/icy-volcanoes-may-dot-pluto-s-surface-1.18756