Pluto
The International Astronomical Union or IAU, was highly critisized for the rumor that Pluto's status as one of the nine planets of our solar system might be changed. The reports indicated that the IAU was planning to reclassify Pluto as a minor planet or what is known as a trans-Neptunian object. This caused a large stir in the astronomical community as well as making the New York times. New York's new Rose Center for Earth and Space, adopted this theory brought out by the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts as well as other groups. When it came out that Pluto was not considered one of the official planets in the exhibit, the New York Times ran the headline "Pluto Not a Planet? Only in New York,", this caused a firestorm of media reports and attention focused on the IAU. This prompted a press realese from the IAU to carify their position. In this press release Johannes Andersen the General Secretary of the IAU tried to clarify what was going on with the status of Pluto.
"No proposal to change the status of Pluto as the ninth planet in the solar system has been made by any Division, Commission, or Working Group of the IAU responsible for solar system science."(IAU Press Release, 1/3/99) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Lately, a substantial number of smaller objects have been discovered in the outer solar system, beyond Neptune, with orbits and possibly other properties similar to those of Pluto. It has been proposed to assign Pluto a number in a techinical catalogue or list of such Trans-Neptunian Objects(TNOs) so that observations and computations concerning these objects can be convenietly collated. This process was explicitly designed to not change Pluto's status as a planet." (IAU Press Release, 1/3/99) Pluto has many simalarities with Earth as well, the rotation of Pluto and its moon Charon, is very similar to the rotation of Earth and our moon. The planets and their moons rotate at the same
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Approximate Word count = 674
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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