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Strange Spots on Pluto Explained

The Hubble images, released in February, revealed Pluto as a molasses-colored world on the fringe of the solar system with surprising variations in brightness across its surface. Based on closer analysis, scientists say the darker spots may represent parts of the ground covered in a tar of primordial organic compounds.

Sunlight hits the methane and breaks it apart into its chemical components – hydrocarbons. Over millions of years this process makes a dark reddish-brown oil or tar-like substance that sticks to the ground. These darker areas spread larger as they absorb more sunlight and cause additional frost to sublimate. The bright spots, in turn, are thought to be related to areas covered in carbon monoxide frost.

These recent views of Pluto shows its appearance is changing with the seasons. But seasons are extremely long on Pluto; It takes 248 Earth-years to make a full trip around the sun. Until the mid-1980s, Pluto’s northern hemisphere was tilted away from the sun for over 100 years, accumulating a substantial amount of frost. Now the northern hemisphere is coming into sunlight and appears, as shown in the Hubble images, to have been growing brighter.

Now that Pluto is headed away from the sun, it will gradually get colder and its atmosphere will refreeze to its surface. In fact, that should have already started happening, but apparently it has not. It’s a mystery. Since Pluto’s atmosphere is so thin, when it freezes it will make only a frosty film of nitrogen and methane.

Image: This is the most detailed view to date of the entire surface of the dwarf planet Pluto, as constructed from multiple NASA Hubble Space Telescope photographs taken from 2002 to 2003. The center disk (180 degrees) has a mysterious bright spot that is unusually rich in carbon monoxide frost.

Source: SPACE.com