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Article: Bound for Pluto ... and beyond: Fastest spacecraft yet launched could help scientists learn about solar system's origins.
- Article from:
- Chicago Tribune (Chicago, IL)
- Article date:
- January 20, 2006
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2006 Chicago Tribune. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: James Janega
Jan. 20--With a flash and roar, the fastest spacecraft mankind has ever launched climbed above Cape Canaveral, Fla., slipped through a gap in gathering clouds and began a 3 billion-mile trip to Pluto and beyond.
Hours earlier in Houston, NASA scientists involved with another space mission announced they had taken a first look at what lies in those outer reaches, thanks to the Stardust probe that returned tiny grains of sooty comet dust to Earth last weekend.
And later this year, particles shed by the sun and collected by a third mission are expected to surrender still more clues to the mysteries of the solar system, ...