NASA finds water and more beneath Pluto’s surface

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has uncovered fascinating new details about Charon, Pluto’s largest moon, shedding light on its surface composition and the processes shaping it.

This recent study, conducted by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), provides crucial insights into Charon and offers new perspectives on the processes that shape it, as well as other distant Kuiper Belt objects and their surfaces, Caliber.Az reports per foreign media.

The Webb Space Telescope’s ability to observe distant objects with unparalleled detail has already led to groundbreaking discoveries about galaxies, stars, and planets.

In this case, however, it is Charon, Pluto's largest moon, that has captured the attention of scientists. Researchers have identified two new materials on the moon's surface: carbon dioxide (CO2) and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). 

These discoveries add to Charon's already diverse chemical makeup, which includes water ice, amines, and other organic compounds. Charon, which is relatively free from volatile ices like methane, provides an ideal environment for processes such as solar exposure and cratering without the usual presence of volatiles, noted Silvia Protopapa, one of the authors of the study.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) conducted a Near-Infrared Spectroscopy study on light reflected from Charon's northern hemisphere between 2022 and 2023.

By Naila Huseynova