Pluto Follow On Missions: Background, Rationale, and New Mission Recommendations

TL;DR

This paper advocates for a dedicated Pluto system orbiter mission to overcome the limitations of the New Horizons flyby, enabling detailed, high-resolution, and temporal studies of Pluto and its moons to advance understanding of its complex geology, atmosphere, and potential interior ocean.

Contribution

It presents a comprehensive rationale and new mission recommendations for a Pluto follow-on orbiter to address scientific questions unanswerable by flybys.

Findings

New Horizons revealed Pluto's complex geology and atmosphere.

Current data are limited by flyby constraints and lack temporal resolution.

A dedicated orbiter would enable detailed, high-resolution, and time-variable studies.

Abstract

The first exploration of Pluto was motivated by (i) the many intriguing aspects of this body, its atmosphere, and its giant impact binary-planet formation; as well as (ii) the scientific desire to initiate the reconnaissance of the newly-discovered population of dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt. That exploration took place in the form of a single spacecraft flyby that yielded an impressive array of exciting results that have transformed our understanding of this world and its satellites, and which opened our eyes to the exciting nature of the dwarf planet population of the Kuiper Belt. From Pluto's five-object satellite system, to its hydrocarbon haze-laden atmosphere, to its variegated distribution of surface volatiles, to its wide array of geologic expressions that include extensive glaciation and suspected cryovolcanoes, plus the tantalizing possibility of an interior ocean, the Pluto system has proven to be as complex as larger terrestrial bodies like Mars, and it begs for future exploration. Owing to Pluto's high obliquity (and consequently, current-epoch southern hemisphere polar winter darkness) and the single spacecraft nature of the New Horizons flyby, only about 40% of Pluto and its binary satellite, Charon, could be mapped at high pixel scales (better than 10 km/pix). Additionally, due to their distances from New Horizons at closest approach, none of Pluto's small moons could be studied at high resolution during the flyby. Furthermore, studies of the time variability of atmospheric, geologic, and surface-atmosphere interactions cannot be practically made by additional flybys, and they cannot be made from Earth-based observations. We find that these limitations, combined with Pluto's many important, open scientific questions, strongly motivate a Pluto System follow on orbiter mission.