Dwarf planet shows ice, little atmosphere

PASADENA, Calif., Aug. 22 (UPI) -- U.S. astronomers say a dwarf planet dubbed Snow White is an icy world covered in water ice that once flowed from ancient, slush-producing volcanoes.

Scientists at the California Institute of Technology say the red-tinged dwarf planet, 2007 OR10, may be covered in a thin layer of methane, the last remnant of an atmosphere slowly being dissipated into space.

"You get to see this nice picture of what once was an active little world with water volcanoes and an atmosphere, and it's now just frozen, dead, with an atmosphere that's slowly slipping away," Mike Brown, Caltech professor of planetary astronomy, said in an institute release Monday.

The small sphere orbits our sun at the edge of the solar system and at about half the size of Pluto is the fifth-largest dwarf planet, astronomers said.

These distant dwarf planets are part of a group of icy bodies called Kuiper Belt Objects.

"We're basically looking at the last gasp of Snow White," Brown said.

"For 4 1/2 billion years, Snow White has been sitting out there, slowly losing its atmosphere, and now there's just a little bit left."