New answers tagged orbital-elements
-5
No, it is a vague term that isn't defined anyhow by the IAU. If you consider the object's hill sphere as what is meant, then Pluto and Eris "cleared their neighbourhood" too. If you consider it the way that Pluto's orbit overlaps with Neptune for instance, then no planet cleared their orbits. There are Mercury-crossing asteroids, Near-Earth asteroids, ...
14
I'm assuming this is Pluto's equatorial plane.
That is incorrect. Charon's right ascension of ascending node with respect to Pluto's equator is undefined. Seemingly paradoxically, it is well defined with respect to Earth's equatorial plane, and since that has become the universal plane of reference, that is what is used.
Charon and Pluto are tidally locked ...
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