Charon is the major moon of Pluto. Our observations showed definitively that it has no atmosphere. We were able to accurately determine its size and shape and calculate its rock-to-ice mass ratio. The rock-to-ice mass ratio that we found supports the theory that Charon was formed during a collision.
Refereed Papers
- Charon’s radius and atmospheric constraints from the stellar occultation observations (Gulbis et al., Nature 439, 48-51, 5 Jan 2006)
- Charon’s Radius and Density from the Combined Data Sets of the 2005 July 11 Occultation (Person et al., Astronomical Journal 132, 1575-1580, October 2006)
Abstracts
- Charon’s radius and atmospheric constraints from the 2005 July 11 stellar occultation (Gulbis et al., B.A.A.S. 37, No. 4, 1751, September 2005)
- Probing small bodies in the outer solar system with stellar occultations (Person et al., European Planetary Science Conference 2008, Münster)
Miscellaneous Information
- July 2005 Charon Occultation PowerPoint
- Occultation of C313.2 by Charon Poster
- 2005 Charon Occultation Press Release
- Movie: July 2005 Charon Occultation as Observed by James Elliot and Elisabeth Adams of MIT. (The lower object is Charon and C313.2 and the upper object is Pluto. Notice the lower object grow dimmer as Charon blocks the light of C313.2, and then brighten as the star reappears.)
- June 2008 Charon Occultation Path
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The drawing above illustrates the relative light gathering areas of the telescopes used in the 2005 Charon occultation observations -
At Pico dos Dias, Brazil (L-R): Steven Souza, Jay Pasachoff, Marcelo Emilio -
At Cerro Armazones, Chile (L-R): Taavi Tuvikene, Joseph Gangestad, Bryce Babcock, Michael Person
