why is pluto not a planet in our solar system?
A lot of us grew up reading about the old nine planets but later pluto was delisted from its status generating mass confusion about its identity so in today's episode let us explore the reason behind pluto's planetary fade and answer a fascinating question
why is pluto not a planet?
anymore in until the year 2005 every school science book thought us that there are nine planets namely mercury venus earth mars jupiter saturn uranus neptune and of course pluto which was the smallest amongst all this celestial body was discovered in by an american astronomer clyde tombo and since then everything was a smooth sail for students across the world but on a warm day in august 2006 few scientists gathered at the international astronomical union in paris and astounded the world by declaring pluto as not a planet after hearing the startling news the educational unions took notes and changed the matter in the textbooks but the vital question is:
why did the scientists community take its title of a planet ?
away well according to iau for a celestial body to be a planet it needs to fulfill three essential criteria first the object should revolve around the sun second the object should be spherical in shape and thirdly the area around its orbit should be clear and should not have any equivalent or a bigger celestial body meaning with the help of its gravity the planet should clear asteroids and dwarf planets out of its way i know what you are thinking isn't pluto spherical and revolves around the sun yes pluto does fulfill these two conditions but in the late 90s space scientists found out that it doesn't meet the third criteria as it hasn't cleared the neighborhood objects around its orbit because of which it can't be called a planet and was downgraded the status of pluto to that of a dwarf planet but pluto isn't the only one to be called a dwarf planet yes in the kuiper belt near pluto scientists found two planets namely homia and make me which were just like pluto not only that but in 2005 the explorers also discovered eris which looked bigger than pluto itself all these newly found space objects acted like pluto but were nowhere similar to other planets in the solar system so that's when the iau came up with a checklist to help them classify a planet and according to it pluto and these other planets fit into the first two criteria that is it revolved around the sun and was spherical but they didn't meet the third which stated that the area surrounding it should be clear hence pluto was out of team planet and landed on team dwarf planet trim your time did you know venetia bernie just 11 years old at the time suggested the name pluto in 1930 also pluto is the only planet in the solar system with ice volcanoes and an ocean hidden under its icy surface
