Pluto May Be a Giant Comet, According to a New Theory

"This leads to a new appreciation of the richness of Pluto’s ‘life story,’ which we are only starting to grasp." the lead author of the study said

Pluto was downgraded from planet to dwarf planet in 2016, and now, scientists say the rock may actually be a sort of giant comet, having formed when a billion or so comets clumped together during the solar system's early days, NBC News reported

The new "cosmochemical" theory is described in a study published May 25 in the journal Icarus in which scientists looked at the composition of a vast glacier that forms the left lobe of a heart-shaped feature on the surface of Pluto. 

"Using chemistry as a detective’s tool, we are able to trace certain features we see on Pluto today to formation processes from long ago," Christopher Glein, a senior research scientist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio and lead author of the study, said in a written statement. "This leads to a new appreciation of the richness of Pluto’s ‘life story,’ which we are only starting to grasp."

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