Why is Pluto no longer a planet?

You might hear one of the most exciting trivia fact, that now Pluto is no longer a planet.It used to be a planet, but what happened now? Why is the status of Pluto changed?

 From 1930 to 2006, Pluto was one of the ninth planets in the solar system.

However, in 2006, it lost his status, the Pluto is same, nothing weird happened on the planet, but a definition of Pluto is changed now. At the time when these changes made, Pluto was no longer met the definition of the planet.

The International Astronomical Union set the new parameter for qualifying a planet; all the astronomical bodies must satisfy these following criteria to be eligible for a planet;

The planet must be in round shape

It must orbit around the sun

The planet must need to have cleared the neighborhood; it means that if the planet travels, the gravity cleans the space around of other objects. Some might crash into the planet while rest becomes the moons.

The Pluto only follows the two rules; it is a round in shape, and its orbit the sun. However, it doesn’t follow the third rule; Pluto is not clearing the neighborhood of its all orbit in the space.

So Pluto is not following the third rule, and Pluto is not eligible to consider as a planet.

But don’t be sad, Pluto is still in the same place in space, only a title changed. A new title “dwarf planet” was assigned to Pluto in 2006.

Do you know what the dwarf planets are?

Dwarf Planets

The Dwarf planet is the celestial body which is the direct orbit of the sun. Means that, it following only two criteria of the new definition of the planet.

All the dwarf planets didn’t yet clear the neighborhoods of their orbits. They must do some cleaning to become true planets.

Pluto is no not alone as a dwarf planet in the space but has five other dwarf planets, and the scientists are expecting to discover more in the future.

Four dwarf planets, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, and Eris, are settled beyond the Neptune and the fifth one, Ceres located in the asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars.

Some interesting of Pluto;

Pluto has almost the same size as of the moon.

Pluto completes a trip around the sun in 248 years. Since the Pluto first discovered in 1930, until now it didn’t complete a single trip around the sun, it still has 159 years to go.

Light of the sun takes five hours to reach a Pluto because the Pluto is very far away from us. The sunlight only takes eight minutes to reach our Planet, Earth!!

At the moment we have, Earth, Mars, Neptune, Jupiter, Uranus, Saturn, Venus, Mercury planets in our Solar System.