Vast Water Ocean Detected On Pluto --"Absolutely Incredible" (Monday's Most Popular) - The Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/.../2016/06/vast-water-ocean-detected-on-pluto-absolutely-incredible.html
When the NASA's New Horizons spacecraft buzzed by Pluto last year, it revealed tantalizing clues that the dwarf planet might have -- or had at one time -- a liquid ocean sloshing around under its icy crust. According to a new analysis such an ocean likely still exists today.
The study, which used a thermal evolution model for Pluto updated with data from New Horizons, found that if Pluto's ocean had frozen into oblivion millions or billions of years ago, it would have caused the entire planet to shrink. But there are no signs of a global contraction to be found on Pluto's surface. On the contrary, New Horizons showed signs that Pluto has been expanding.
"Thanks to the incredible data returned by New Horizons, we were able to observe tectonic features on Pluto's surface, update our thermal evolution model with new data and infer that Pluto most likely has a subsurface ocean today," said Noah Hammond, a Ph.d candidate in Brown University's Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences, and the study's lead author.
