Kaczmarczik Lecture: New Horizons and the Exploration of the Pluto System

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

12:00 PM-1:00 PM

S. Alan Stern, PhD, principal investigator of the New Horizons Mission to Pluto

New Horizons is NASA’s historic mission to explore the Pluto system and the Kuiper Belt. The fastest spacecraft ever launched, New Horizons left Earth on January 19th 2006. In 2015, it made the first exploration of the Pluto system —3 billion miles from Earth — culminating with a highly successful flyby inside the orbits of all five of Pluto’s moons on July 14th. The spacecraft carries a sophisticated payload of imagers and other scientific instruments that were used to revolutionize our knowledge of Pluto and its five moons.

S. Alan Stern, PhD, will describe the history of this mission, the science behind it, the capabilities of the payload, our encounter with planet Pluto, and the major scientific discoveries made to date. He will also briefly outline the proposed New Horizons extended mission to fly across the Kuiper Belt, exploring further into space.

The event is free and open to the public. Read more and register

Contact Information

Jackie Sampson
kaczlectures@einstein.physics.drexel.edu