newhorizons

A Photo of a Sunset Over the Mountains of Pluto

NASA has released a spectacular new photo of Pluto that was captured by its New Horizons spacecraft during the flyby on July 14th, 2015. This latest one shows a near-sunset view of the icy mountains on Pluto surface, poking up on a curved horizon.

This Amazing High-Res View of Pluto Was Made Using 26 New NASA Photos

Last week, NASA released a number of new close-up photos captured by its New Horizons spacecraft during its historic flyby of Pluto back in July. Many of the images showed the details of specific regions of Pluto's surface.

Photographer Daniel Machacek took 26 of those photos, combined them, and colorized them to create the amazing "global mosaic" of Pluto seen above.

This is How Our Photos of Pluto Have Improved Over the Years

Pluto was first discovered on February 18, 1930, by a 23-year-old man named Clyde Tombaugh, who compared photos captured 6 days apart and discovered the dwarf planet moving between the two shots. Since then, scientists have created numerous photos of Pluto over the years, but none clearer than the ones NASA made over the past week with the New Horizons space probe.

Here's a look at how mankind's view of Pluto has gotten sharper over the years as we've pointed better (and closer) cameras at it.

Just In: The Clearest Photo of Pluto Taken So Far

Prior to this year, humankind didn't have a good idea of what Pluto looked like. NASA's New Horizons spacecraft is working to change that. It has been steadily flying toward the dwarf planet over the past many months, and on July 14th, during a flyby, we'll be seeing the first-ever clear photos of Pluto.

On July 7th, New Horizons snapped the above photo of Pluto from 5 million miles away, giving us the clearest view yet of what Pluto looks like. Back in April, we shared a previous closest-ever view that showed Pluto as a blurry dot, as seen from 71 million miles away.

The Closest Color Photo of Pluto Ever Shot

After a nine year journey towards the outer edge of our solar system, NASA's New Horizons spacecraft has beamed back its first color photo of Pluto and its largest moon Charon. The photo above, captured "just" 71 million miles away from the dwarf planet, is the closest color photo ever made of Pluto.