Pluto just celebrated its anniversary last year and commemorated it later in the year with a demotion from status as the ninth planet in our solar system to a significant dwarf planet. The discovery of Pluto was made seventy-six years ago and scientists still don’t really know much about this icy cold celestial body. There are many questions about this dwarf planet and very few answers. For instance, astronomers have no idea what Pluto is really comprised of or how it was created. And why does it have such a weird orbit in comparison with the eight planets in our solar system line-up?

The quest for the discovery of Pluto began long before Clyde Tombaugh found it in the heavens back in 1930. Percival Lowell earlier in 1905 theorized that there was another planet out there in the outer edges of our solar system. Back then, Lowell referred to it as Planet X. Before Lowell could prove his theory, he died. It is interesting to note that Tombaugh discovered Pluto while working at the Lowell Observatory. Planet X was no longer a theory; it was fact.

Pluto is an oddball when compared to the other eight planets in the solar system. Its orbital path is more oblong than elliptical and it doesn’t even orbit the same plane as the other eight planets. Rather, its orbit is inclined by about seventeen degrees. In addition, a lot of Pluto’s orbit is beyond Neptune. But because of the path’s oblong shape, part of Pluto’s orbit travels inside Neptune’s orbital path on its two hundred forty-eight year trek around the Sun.

Besides the planets, comets and asteroids also orbit the Sun along the main plane of the solar system. A few comets however are a bit contrary and have inclined orbits just like Pluto. This observation along with the small size of Pluto brought forth a number of hypotheses that Pluto should never have been classified as a planet but rather a celestial body part of the Kuiper belt, which is a frozen field of rocky debris beyond the planet Neptune.

In fact, it was the discovery of a number of objects within the Kuiper belt, some larger than Pluto that led to a universal definition of a planet and the ultimate demotion of Pluto to dwarf planet status. Before the ultimate demise of its planet status, NASA already had plans to launch the spacecraft New Horizons to Pluto as well as its moon Charon and several points within the Kuiper belt. Just because it was no longer a planet did not mean that it was no less important.

Pluto has been an icon of sorts for the layman in terms of Astronomy, sort of an underdog – mighty but misunderstood. It has been over seventy-five years since its discovery and Pluto is as still as much of an enigma as before. What we know about it has been seen through the eyes of a telescope and some images project from the Hubble Space telescope. And even those images don’t give up many details. Most everything that is said about Pluto is theory. For instance, scientists speculate that while Pluto appears to have practically no atmosphere, it does experience wind storms and seasonal changes. Also, scientists believe that maybe Pluto was formed billions of years ago in a cosmic event in which it was struck by similar object.

Unfortunately, there is too much speculation and not enough fact about Pluto to give any definitive answers. However, the launch of New Horizons before Pluto’s anniversary could pave the way to a better understanding about our newest classified dwarf planet. The world just has to wait until the year 2015, Pluto’s 85th anniversary to get some answers.

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