NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, which launched in January of 2006, completed a flyby of Jupiter on February 2007. Its main target is the Pluto System, which the New Horizons should reach, if everything goes as planned, by July 2015. Fuel allowing, the spacecraft will then go on to investigate the Kuiper Belt.
"New Horizons will be the first to go and visit the Kuiper Belt. We've never been there before. Our first target is Pluto, and it's a scientific wonderland. We have a chance to understand the bombardment history of our solar system cause most of the bombardment comes through the Kuiper Belt," said Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
"We'll map the geology of Pluto and its satellites and map the composition of these dwarf planets. New Horizons will offer to open up a window into a whole new class of objects. We will then fly on and look at one or two Kuiper Belt objects if we have enough fuel," he said.
Here are some earlier photos of Jupiter taken by New Horizons.
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