NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has provided the first evidence of recent liquid flow on Pluto, specifically liquid nitrogen rising to the surface within the Sputnik Planitia glacier. The findings, led by Dr. Alan Stern, suggest Pluto is more geologically active than previously thought.
A new analysis led by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) Associate Vice President Dr. Alan Stern, principal investigator of the New Horizons mission, indicates that liquid nitrogen may be seeping onto Pluto’s frozen surface near the northern edge of Sputnik Planitia. Sputnik Planitia is a vast, Texas-and-Oklahoma-sized glacier composed largely of frozen nitrogen. Images from the New Horizons mission, taken in 2015 and 2016, revealed city-sized geologic convection cells within the glacier’s northern region, separated by dark lines and patches.
Researchers examined these features and propose they may be temporarily wetted by liquid nitrogen rising through cracks from beneath the ice. Computer models support the idea that nitrogen can melt at the glacier’s base and travel upward. “Pluto never stops surprising us,” said Dr. Stern, “and this new result certainly does that. In addition to suggesting that liquids have recently expressed themselves on Pluto's surface, it also suggests a new kind of time-variable feature on Pluto.”
The team compared the Pluto observations with NASA Landsat 9 images of Greenland’s ice sheet. On Greenland, dark markings appear where liquid water is present on the ice. Similar patterns on Sputnik Planitia suggest a comparable process involving subsurface liquid nitrogen. The research was published in the peer-reviewed *Planetary Science Journal*. Liquid nitrogen cannot exist as rain on Pluto due to the dwarf planet’s atmospheric conditions.
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