1. NEW HORIZONS NASA’s Pluto-Kuiper Belt Mission:
“The First Mission to the Last Planet”

2. Major Project Milestones
Proposal – Jan-Sep 2001
Phase A Study Complete – Oct 2001
Selection Announcement – Nov 2001
Phase B Start – Jan 2002
Requirements Review (SRR) – May 2002
Preliminary Design Review (PDR) – Oct 2002
Non-Advocate Review (NAR) – Dec 2002
Phase C/D Start – Apr 2003
Critical Design Review (CDR) – Oct 2003
Instrument Deliveries – July 2004-Mar 2005
Integration & Test – Aug 2004-May 2005
Environmental Test – May-Aug 2005
Ship to Cape – 23 Sep 2005
Launch Readiness Review – 11 Dec 2005
Launch Window Opens– 11 Jan 2006

3. Great Progress is Fundamentally Limited Until We Visit
This is the fundamental exploration lesson of planetary science.
Pluto at
Best HST Resolution
Triton at
Best HST Resolution
Earth’s Moon at the
Same Resolution

4. Pluto: A Little Background
Pluto was discovered in January-February 1930, by Clyde Tombaugh at Lowell Observatory, Arizona.
Pluto is a Small, Distant World
<1% Mars’s Max Apparent Diameter (0.1 arcsec)
And 50,000 times fainter than Mars (V~14)

5. Pluto: A Misfit Orbit? Distance from the Sun varies from 30 to 50 AU
Orbital Period: 248 years
Eccentricity: 0.25
Inclination: 16 deg

6. Pluto: Some Basic Properties
Rotation Period: 6.4 days (retrograde)
Axial Tilt (obliquity): 118 deg
Mass: 0.2% Earth’s (1.5x1025 gm)
Diameter: 18% Earth’s (1180 km)
Reflectivity: 50% (due to its icy surface)
The Best Hubble
Images of Pluto
Are Still Crude

7. Major Breakthroughs Began
In the 1970s
N2 and CO ices were later discovered.
The CH4, N2, CO distribution is patchy.
But N2 dominates almost 10:1
True Color Map

8. And Continued Through The 1980s and 1990s
Pluto’s surface temperature has been measured from Earth and from Earth orbit.
The temperature expected for typical Plutonian surfaces warmed by the Sun at 30 AU is just 55 K.
Pluto’s surface has been found to exhibit both warm units near 60 K and cold units near 35 K.

9. Pluto’s Atmosphere
Pluto has an atmosphere; it was definitively detected in 1988 by a refractive signature seen in a stellar occultation.
It is composed of N2, CO, and CH4, plus trace species; there is evidence for hazes.
The atmosphere is thought to be escaping to space hydrodynamically.
An occultation in 2003
revealed distinct structural and pressure changes.

10. The Discovery of Pluto’s Moon:
Charon
Charon was discovered, by accident, in July 1978 by Jim Christy
of the U.S. Naval Observatory.
Charon is in synchronous orbit ~19,400 km from Pluto, and spin-spin-orbit locked with a 6.4 day period.
0.9 arc-sec

11. Pluto: A Clear Outlier Among A Dwarf Planet and A True Binary World
The Giant Planets
A Dwarf Planet and A True Binary World
Charon’s radius is 50% of Pluto’s.
Charon’s mass is about 10% of Pluto’s.

12. And Do Not Judge This Book By Its Cover
From the Densities of Pluto and Charon,
One Can Derive Crude Interior Models.
Pluto is a primarily rocky, not icy body!

13. Your Father’s Solar System
Featured Misfit Pluto
Until the 1990s, Pluto was considered a planetary oddity, not fitting in the larger architecture of the solar system.

14. Revealed Pluto’s Context
But the 1990s Clearly
Revealed Pluto’s Context
The Kuiper Belt

15. The Discovery Of the Kuiper Belt
1992– Jewitt & Luu found a 100 km sized object in a near-circular orbit, well beyond Pluto.
1993– 4 more KBOs found.
1994– 10 KBOs found.
2005– Over 1000 KBOs are now known.

16. The Kuiper Belt
Over 140,000 KBOs predicted with diameters >100 km, orbits AU (assuming 4% reflectivity).
Billions of smaller comets are also predicted to exist there.
The largest KBOs are well over
2000 km in diameter.
Three Orbit Types:
Plutinos– Neptune resonant, a<50 AU
Classical– Non-resonant, a<50 AU
Scattered– Distant (a>50 AU), Neptune ejected

17. Large KBOs Abound The large KBOs are planetary embryos.
These objects reached the mid-stage of planetary accretion.
They are dwarf planets.

18. As Do KBO Satellites
Pluto/Charon was only the first binary object (1978).
Next up: 1998 WW31 (2001).
16 KBO binaries discovered so far (late 2004).
Implication: >20% of all KBOs have satellites.

19. Pluto-Charon: A Treasure Trove for Science
Pluto is neither a terrestrial nor a gas giant planet: It is a wholly new type: an ice dwarf, common to the deep outer solar system.
Pluto-Charon is the solar system’s only known binary planet, with implications for atmospheric transfer and for better understanding the formation of the Earth-Moon system.
Pluto’s atmosphere is provides the only likely site of planetary hydrodynamic escape, the process believed to have shaped Earth’s primordial atmospheric loss.
Pluto-Charon’s surfaces record the detailed history of outer solar system bombardment.
The Kuiper Belt is also the best
archeological site to explore
mid-stage accretion in the outer
solar system.

20. A Reconnaissance Expedition To the Kuiper Belt & Pluto-Charon
Toward New Horizons
The Highest Priority New Frontiers New Start Recommendation of the NRC’s 2002 Planetary Decadal Survey
A Reconnaissance Expedition
To the Kuiper Belt & Pluto-Charon

21. NASA-Specified Pluto-Charon Measurement Objectives
Required
Important
Desired

22. Proposal Phase Science Team:
Alan Stern, PI/SwRI
Fran Bagenal/ U. Colorado
Rick Binzel/MIT
Bonnie Buratti/JPL
Andy Cheng/APL
Dale Cruikshank/NASA Ames
Randy Gladstone/SwRI
Will Grundy/Lowell
Dave Hinson/Stanford
Mihaly Horanyi/U. Colorado
Don Jennings/NASA Goddard
Ivan Linscott/Stanford
Jeff Moore/NASA Ames
Dave McComas/SwRI
Bill McKinnon/Washington U.
Ralph McNutt/APL
Scott Murchie/APL
Carolyn Porco/SSI
Harold Reitsema/Ball Aerospace
Dennis Reuter/NASA Goddard
Dave Slater/SwRI
John Spencer/SwRI
Darrel Strobel/Johns Hopkins
Mike Summers/GMU
Len Tyler/Stanford
Hal Weaver/APL
Leslie Young/SwRI
New Horizons was proposed to AO-OSS-01, NASA’s January 20, 2001 request for flyby mission proposals to Pluto-Charon and the Kuiper Belt.
New Horizons was selected by NASA on 29 Nov 2001.

23. The Initial Reconnaissance of The Solar System’s
A Historic Journey
The Initial Reconnaissance of The Solar System’s
“Third Zone”
KBOs
Pluto-Charon
July 2015
Jupiter System
March 2007
Launch
Jan 2006

24. Project Philosophy Offer early and highly-leveraged science.
Do so on time, within budget, and at low risk.
Provide Intensive Public Outreach
Keep It Simple

25. Launch Vehicle: Atlas V 551 With A STAR-48 Upper Stage
Centaur Interstage
Adapter (12.5 ft Dia)
CCB Cylindrical
Interstage Adapter
RD-180 Engine
Common Core
BoosterTM (CCB)
Single
RL10 Engine
Centaur
Upper
Stage
5-meter Short Payload
Fairing (68 ft)
Solid Rocket
Boosters
Aft Transition
Skirt/Heat Shield
5-Meter
Payload Fairing
Boattail
Aft Stub
Adapter
Centaur Forward
Load Reactor
Payload
Adapter (PLA)
Centaur Conical

26. Instrument Payload REX LORRI ALICE PEPSSI RALPH SWAP
CORE:
REX radio science & radiometry
RALPH VIS/IR imaging & spectroscopy
ALICE UV imaging spectroscopy
Supplemental:
LORRI High-resolution imager
SWAP plasma spectrometer
PEPSSI energetic particle spectrometer
SDC EPO Student Dust Counter
SWAP
Student Dust Counter

27. The Student Dust Counter: A New Kind of EPO
EPO Goal: Give students a chance to design, build, operate, & study data from a planetary flight experiment.
Science Goal: Make the first dust density & size spectrum observations beyond 18 AU.
Students have the primary responsibility for the design and development of the SDC; over 35 “first generation” students were involved at CU, with dozens more participating across the U.S.
Four Generations of Students To Be Involved.
SDC Student Team Leaders

28. Spacecraft Block Diagram

29. Launch Windows Overview
2006 Primary
Jan 11-Feb 14 Jan ‘06
Window: 34 days
C3: 164 km2/s2
Earliest Arrival 2015
2007 Backup
02–15 Feb ‘07
Window: 14 days
C3: 166 km2/s2
Earliest Arrival 2019
Requires KBO Fuel Removal
New Horizons will be launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida in early 2006.
It will be the fastest spacecraft ever launched. NH
Star 48B
Atlas V

30. Jupiter Flyby Objectives
Gravity Assist (Speed Trajectory to Pluto)
Encounter Ops Practice
Instrument Calibrations
Jupiter System Science
C/A Date
10–14 Mar 2007
Range
38–39 RJupiter
The New Horizons approaches Jupiter more than three times closer to Jupiter than Cassini did.

31. Jupiter Flyby Science
Jupiter science will include studies of Jovian meteorology, satellite geology and composition,
Auroral phenomena, and magnetospheric physics.

32. New Horizons Will Yield Dramatic Results at Pluto-Charon
Triton from Voyager
Triton and Pluto at Best HST Resolution

33. Pluto-Charon Encounter Highlights
Six months of encounter science.
Exceed Hubble resolution for months.
Map all of Pluto and all of Charon.
Make global composition maps of Pluto and Charon.
Map their surface temperature fields.
Directly measure Pluto’s escape rate and assay its atmospheric structure and composition.
Improve interior models and determine if either Pluto or Charon differentiated.
Locate additional Pluto-system satellites <1 km in diameter.
The most exciting discoveries
will likely be the ones we
Don’t anticipate.

34. Selected New Horizons KBO Science
Geologic, Photometric, Color Mapping
Composition Maps (H2O,CO,CO2,CH4,..)
Stereo Surface Mapping
Thermal Mapping
Atmosphere Search
Measure Sputtering Products
Mass, Density, Figure Measurements
Crater Counts for Impactors <20 m in Size
Satellite Searches to <1 km, with Follow-up Studies

35. New Horizons at the Cape

36. Atlas V-010 in Denver

37. Mission Status Summary
Project Element
Status
Spacecraft GO
Payload
RTG
Atlas V
STAR-48
PI & Science

38. Toward New Frontiers
New Horizons is Demonstrating That Exciting, Lower Cost Outer Planet Missions Are Indeed Feasible.

39. We Aim to Make This 1990 U.S. Stamp Obsolete
And One More Thing
We Aim to Make This 1990 U.S. Stamp Obsolete

40. Someday, Hopefully

41. A Historic Journey of Exploration