Key Points
Charon, discovered in 1978, has the distinction of being the solar system's largest moon relative in size to the planet it orbits...
Observations by the James Webb Space Telescope are giving scientists a fuller understanding about the composition and evolution of Pluto's moon Charon, the largest moon orbiting any of our solar system's dwarf planets...
Webb for the first time detected carbon dioxide and hydrogen peroxide - both frozen as solids - on the surface of Charon, a spherical body about 750 miles (1,200 km) in diameter, researchers said on Tuesday..
The presence of hydrogen peroxide speaks to the irradiation processes Charon has experienced over time, the researchers said, while the carbon dioxide is probably an original component dating to this moon's formation about 4.5 billion years ago...
The hydrogen peroxide, the researchers said, formed as the water ice on Charon's surface was chemically altered by the perpetual onslaught of ultraviolet radiation from the sun as well as energetic particles from the solar wind and from galactic cosmic rays that traverse the universe...
