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| NASA |
A New Horizons spacecraft photo revealed Thursday shows the dwarf planet has ice clusters traveling the Sputnik Planum region, which is the informally named icy plain left of the planet's "heart."
Scientists believe the icebergs are floating in a similar way that icebergs travel along the Arctic Ocean on Earth.
The New Horizons team believes the icebergs are smaller versions of nearby mountains that broke free and drifted away over time, following the nitrogen-filled glacier flow.
Pluto's icebergs eventually got pushed back to the shoreline and clustered in groups reaching up to 12 miles across. The largest accumulation of hills measures 37 by 22 miles.
The icebergs were found in the same area scientists described as a "lava lamp" earlier this year.
New Horizons scientists said the Sputnik Planum reminds them of a lava lamp because it's separated into cells, or polygons, 10 to 25 miles wide that stem from the slow thermal convection of the nitrogen-dominated ices in the area.
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