"We were definitely surprised by the 'kiss' part of kiss-and-capture. There hasn't really been a kind of impact before where the two bodies only temporarily merge before re-separating!" ...

Pluto likely acquired large moon Charon in a “kiss and capture” collision billions of years ago. It may have created a subsurface ocean on the icy dwarf planet.

Scientists have discovered a new type of planetary collision called “kiss-and-capture,” where Pluto and proto-Charon briefly ...

New research suggests Pluto may have had a “kiss” with its largest moon billions of years ago in a harmless collision. The report, published in “Nature Geoscience,” describes how the ...

For a very brief period — perhaps only hours — they danced as if arm in arm before gently separating, a grand do-si-do that resulted in Pluto and its quintet of moons orbiting the sun together ...

Amanda Kooser covers the quirky side of science and space. Pluto has five moons, but Charon stands out from the rest. Charon is half the size of Pluto, “making it the largest known moon relative ...

The MoonSwatch has been nothing short of a phenomenon. Three years on from its chaotic launch, the watch is still in huge ...

The love story between Pluto and Charon may have started with a kiss. A new study suggests the dwarf planet and its scarcely smaller moon likely came together in a collision that saw them ...

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For decades, astronomers have tried to determine how Pluto acquired its unusually large moon Charon, which is about half the size of the dwarf planet. Now, new research suggests that Pluto and ...