Pluto dismissed

You must be aware that Pluto was one of the nine planets in the solar system and had a diameter (at the equator) of 2,250 km. It is about 5.900 million km away from the Sun. It was discovered by a US astronomer named Clyde Tombaugh in 1930. However, today, Pluto is no longer a member of our solar system...

It is now considered to be only a dwarf planet. Its fate was decided on Thursday, August 24, by a vote among members of the International Astronomical Union in Prague. This decision was taken based on the facts that Pluto is very small, takes a lot of time to go around the Sun, and doesn't have a particular shape.

Now there are only eight planets in the solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The three recognised dwarf planets were Pluto, Ceres (formally an asteroid), and the largest dwarf, UB313, popularly known as Xena.

Many more dwarf planets will be added to this list. Most will be icy middle weight objects in the Kuiper Belt out beyond Neptune, and one or two may be asteroids.

As a tribute to Pluto, all the other dwarf planets found beyond Neptune will be named after Pluto. So, what we learnt in school for generations, has now been changed.

J.A.