News Planetary Science

Pluto’s four littlest moons probably born in a crash

One satellite, Kerberos, is far darker than its siblings

FOUR’S A CROWD  Pluto’s outer moons, in a Hubble Space Telescope image, are tightly packed in nearly synced orbits, suggesting that they formed in the wake of a collision.

NASA, ESA, M. Showalter/SETI Institute

By Christopher Crockett

- More than 2 years ago

Of Pluto’s five satellites, four — Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra — are packed together about as tightly as possible, researchers report in the June 4 Nature.