The Atmosphere of pluto is expanding as it gets colder?

This story is causing some commotion among astronomers... it seems that, as Pluto goes Away from the sun, that its atmosphere is expanding:

www.space.com...

I have often thought that poor ole pluto never really get's as much attention as the other planets, as pluto is the farthest away but believe me, no less important in the alignment then the other planets! I didn't read the entire page of the link you provided, so if my concern/question is answered there could you please tell me in your thoughts or words, I'm too lazy to read all that stuff that I might not fully understand..

Do you think that this could cause a somewhat drastic imbalance in the solar system? What I mean is do you think it could throw things out there out of whack..cause changes somewhat like a chain reaction? I think it could and this is why this has got my interest and concern..Also pluto is one of my favorite planets
Magestica

*edit* Can't spell for chit!*

[Edited on 7/11/03 by magestica]

I don't believe that there is much risk to this issue. If the atmosphere is expanding now then it was doing it millions of years ago, we just couldn't detect it. Kind of like carcinogens make you think twice about what your eating now, but not when you were younger. Same thing, an expanding atmosphere ***shouldn't*** cause much concern in the solar system way of thinking.


Not to mention that Pluto's entire atmosphere is so thin that is probably couldn't create a windstorm in the land area of the US alone.

regards

_the Wiz

[Edited on 11-7-2003 by Shining Wizard]

Now that makes sense! You are so right there are things we find out today becuase we simply have that ability, whereas we didn't long ago. But they did study the stars with their measly ways back then and were able to detect certain changes, that we detect now with our advanced technology..So perhaps they did infact feel the influence of the planets or changes..just with what they had..

And really I have no idea why I said all that! There was a point but someone IMed me and I lost it..anyway, what's to say that they did know and if it was expanding then, then they'd have known and we would know before we actually know?? So it could be something very new that just started happening, and could cause some troubles?
Mags

That this is a new event, but I fail to see any ramifications that would impact us. If you would have continued to read the dry, boring, but infomative web page it basically states that it is causing large windstorms on Pluto, which roughly equates to this


.

But you say this is earth > O
and this is pluto> .

So because they greatly differ in size it couldn't possibly cause something to happen that we might feel or see or whatever? What I was thinking really is that it might cause like a chain of events which will inevitably lead to us..as we are in that chain. We/ earth, is blanced by those planets, we need them to function properly and if one, even the tiniest one, explodes I think it would affect us. (my pinky toe is tiny, but I can feel it if someone steps on it) Size doesn't seem to matter when we are talking about things that balance one another out. But that's just how I see it..
Mags

Well the expansion of the atmosphere is obviously caused by aliens.......

I think pluto is to small to be a planet, its more like a moon or a chunk or asteroid that got caught in our solar system and froze up.... Anyway i think pluto is to small and to far away for us to take proper notice of it, that might sound dumb considering we can see into other Galaxies but theres a diffrence to what we know about Mars and some nebula because we have gotten a closer look at it...

Titan and pluto would be very interesting places to get a close look at i think theres a satelite heading for Titan soon.... Im very curious to see the results

Well, Pluto is a planet simply because it orbits the sun on its own... though there are some scientists who think that it should just be reclassified as a planetoid, as there are many other objects like it at the edge of the solar system (if you consider Pluto a planet, you have to consider Qouar (sp) and Ixion planets, too, they say).

So far as knocking-off orbits within the solar system... since Pluto's total mass isn't changing, only changing state, its orbit should stay the same.