REJECTED AS A PLANET

The reason Pluto lost its planet status is not valid and is erroneous, scientists argued challenging previously held theories.

A team led by Philip Metzger, planetary scientist at the University of Central Florida (UCF) in Orlando, noted that the basis on which Pluto was rejected as a planet has no support in the research literature.

In 2006, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) — a global group of astronomy experts — established that to be called a planet, it is required to “clear” its orbit, or in other words, be the largest gravitational force in its orbit. As per the deinition, Pluto does not meet the criteria, since Neptune’s gravity inluences it. Reviewing scientiic literature from the past 200 years, Metzger found only one publication, from 1802, that used the clearing-orbit requirement to classify planets, and it was based on sincedisproven reasoning.

“It’s a sloppy deinition,” Metzger said, adding “they didn’t say what they meant by clearing their orbit. If you take that literally, then there are no planets, because no planet clears its orbit.”