Strange Lights on Dwarf Planet Ceres Have Scientists Perplexed

Strange Lights on Dwarf Planet Ceres Have Scientists Perplexed - by Chris Taylor/ World/ Mashable.com


Two strange reflective patches spotted on Ceres.
Image: NASA, JPL


"A dwarf planet is shining two bright lights at a NASA spacecraft right now, and our smartest

A dwarf planet is shining two bright lights at a NASA spacecraft right now, and our smartest scientists are unsure what they are.

As bizarre as that sentence sounds, that's the situation with Ceres — the largest object in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, officially designated as a dwarf planet (the same category as Pluto).

NASA's Dawn spacecraft is approaching Ceres ahead of a March 6 rendezvous. The picture above was taken February 19, from a distance of just under 29,000 miles, and shows two very shiny areas on the same basin on Ceres' surface..."


Richard

I'm sure Bill can tell us what the lights are…

I figured it out!

Motel 6

We'll keep the lights on for ya.

BTW - if you read the article, it's not a "light," it's actually a reflection, which is a much different thing.

MVCI has already started selling timeshares. "Ceres Crater Club" 1Br, 2Br, 3Br oxygen included with maint fees.

Mr. Vker said:

MVCI has already started selling timeshares. "Ceres Crater Club" 1Br, 2Br, 3Br oxygen included with maint fees.

Click to expand...

But that "benefit" doesn't transfer to resale owners.

Kurt

It's the duller side of large sheets of aluminum foil covered with a light layer of fog.

DeniseM said:

I'm sure Bill can tell us what the lights are…

Click to expand...

Ok then, I'll chime in.

Ceres is the old Roman goddess of farming. To see her wink would mean good fortune.

http://www.ceresva.org/Goddess/Ceres.htm


The best explanation I have read so far is that the shine is a reflection from ice deposited by a comet impact.

Bill

Dawn Spacecraft Sees Spots as it Approaches Mysterious Ceres - by Lee Billings/ Space News/ ScientificAmerican.com

"Spectacular new images are trickling in from NASA’s mission to a dwarf planet in the Asteroid Belt..."


Richard

NASA Spacecraft Nears Orbit with Ceres, Mysterious Bright Spots - by Graham Templeton/ Extreme/ extremetech.com

"Ceres (pronounced “series”) is in the asteroid belt — but it’s not just an asteroid. Technically, Ceres is also a dwarf planet (the only one inside the orbit of Pluto), making it an improbable body that’s of immediate interest to astronomers. Jets of what looks to be water vapor have been spotted, sparking the same speculation about alien life that extra-terrestrial water always does. It’s unlikely Ceres holds life, but as both an asteroid and a planet it could offer unique insights into the history of the solar system. As of a few months ago, it was also the site of a major astronomical mystery — and today, mankind finally arrives.

The Dawn spacecraft is scheduled to arrive at Ceres today, carrying a scientific payload that was previously trained on the second largest object in the asteroid belt, called Vesta. Using its pioneering ion propulsion system, which provides low, constant thrust with remarkably little onboard fuel, Dawn was able to not just perform a flyby, but bump itself into a stable orbit. Soon, Dawn’s ion thrusters will direct it into a similar spiral around Ceres, making it the first ever multi-target mission to enter a stable orbit around two different objects in deep space..."




Richard

Pretty neat.
I like the timeshare jokes in this thread too.

VegasBella said:

Pretty neat.
I like the timeshare jokes in this thread too.

Click to expand...

Yes, me too. We have some very witty Tuggers.


Richard

Dawn Spacecraft Sees Spots as it Approaches Mysterious Ceres - by Lee Billings/ ScientificAmerican.com

"The largest and most mysterious resident of the debris belt between Mars and Jupiter is an icy world called Ceres, and it’s on the threshold of being explored up close for the first time by NASA’s Dawn mission, which is scheduled to enter Ceres’s orbit on March 6.

Discovered in 1801 by the Italian astronomer Giuseppe Piazzi, Ceres was initially thought to be a full-fledged planet. That began to change when one of Piazzi’s rivals, the astronomer William Herschel, noted that Ceres only appeared as a point of light in his telescope rather than a resolved disk, like the other known planets. To Herschel that meant Ceres was probably too small to be considered a planet, and he coined the term “asteroid” to describe its starlike appearance. Ceres received a minor upgrade to “dwarf planet” in 2006, part of the same process that demoted Pluto to the same status.

Whatever you call may call it, Ceres is one of the most geologically interesting and strange objects in the solar system. Its shape, size and composition—round, roughly the size of Texas and at least 20 percent water ice—place it at the poorly understood transition point between rocky worlds like Earth and icy worlds like Jupiter’s Europa, Saturn’s Enceladus, and other large moons of the outer solar system. Other than blurry Hubble Space Telescope images from 2004, its surface had scarcely been glimpsed until Dawn’s approach. As the spacecraft’s ion engines slowly push it toward Ceres, the dwarf planet’s details are now coming into focus, revealing tantalizing new details with practically every new image..."


Richard

Dawn Spacecraft Images Reveal "Ice Rinks" on Ceres - by Lee Billings/ Space News/ ScientificAmerican.com

"Bright spots in the latest pictures from NASA’s mission to the dwarf planet may be water ice, researchers say.

Something weird is happening on the dwarf planet Ceres, which at 950 kilometers wide is the largest object in the Asteroid Belt. Since its arrival in Ceres’s vicinity earlier this spring, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has glimpsed mysterious, highly reflective bright spots dotting the surface. No one yet knows what exactly they are or how they got there.

Periodically snapping pictures as it gradually spirals down to a low-altitude “survey” orbit, Dawn has provided a slow-motion zoom-in on the dwarf planet, allowing imaginations to run wild as experts and laypeople alike seek to discern structures and patterns in the low-resolution images. Consequently, many possible explanations for the bright spots have emerged, some more plausible than others, and the ideas shift with each new vista Dawn beams home. The spots could be salts deposited by briny vapors from gushing geysers or, less likely, plumes from water-spewing “cryovolcanoes.”

Now some scientists think the spots may be reflections from water ice, after viewing Dawn’s newest images. These pictures—taken from an altitude of 13,500 kilometers and at a resolution of 1.3 kilometers per pixel—capture a full rotation of Ceres. That relatively high resolution allowed researchers to determine that the brightness and flatness of some of the spots closely matches what would be expected of ice. It also revealed that what looked to be one or two large bright spots in a crater actually is a complex of many much smaller spots. “As our pictures have increased in resolution, the brightest spot broke into two spots, and now we can see a whole field of tiny spots in that crater,” says Christopher Russell, principal investigator for the Dawn mission at the University of California, Los Angeles. “We are now sure that the light could be sunlight bouncing back from the surface, similar to what we would expect from a reflection from ice on the surface.”..."


Taken on May 4, 2015, this best-yet image of the dwarf planet Ceres reveals that the large bright spots in a crater in its northern hemisphere are composed of many smaller spots. The brightness and flatness of the spots suggest they may be made of water ice.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA


Richard

The British are coming by sea!

White Spots, Lone Mountains, and Other Funny Business on Ceres - by Corey S Powell/ Out There/ Science for the Curious/ discovermagazine.com

"“The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka’ but ‘That’s funny…'” That quote, delivered by the brilliant science writer Isaac Asimov, keeps popping into my head as I look at the remarkable new images of Ceres. NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has been orbiting the dwarf planet since March 6, scrutinizing a landscape that is not quite like anything humans have ever seen before.

One detail on Ceres jumped out almost immediately: a bizarre white spot, drastically brighter than its drab surroundings...."



Lonely mountain does not appear to be associated with any nearby impact or eruptive feature. It’s also the only one of its kind on Ceres. (Credit: NASA/JPL/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA)


Richard

NASA Reveals the Most Detailed Views Yet of Ceres' Bizarre Bright Spots - by Miriam Kramer/ World/ Mashable/ mashable.com

"NASA's Dawn spacecraft is finally giving scientists on Earth a truly close up view of the dwarf planet Ceres' distinctive bright spots, and they remain stubbornly mysterious.

A new photo showing the most distinctive of the reflective patches in the dwarf planet's Occator crater reveals a dome covered with the bright material, which might be salt, according to research published last year..."


The brightest spot in the Occator crater on Ceres (left) and dimmer spots (right) shine in enhanced color.


Richard

NASA'S Dawn Mission Offers a Closer Look at the Dwarf Planet Ceres - by Mariella Moon/ Latest in Science/ Engadget/ engadget.com


"If New Horizons is providing us tons of info about Pluto, the Dawn mission is helping us get to know Ceres a lot better. NASA has released new photos and information that the Dawn spacecraft took and gathered in its lowest orbit around the dwarf planet. They've recently found that the brightest area on the celestial body, a spot smack-dab in the center of the Occator Crater, has a dome inside a smooth-walled pit. You can see an image of the area above, which the agency enhanced to highlight the color differences of Ceres' surface.

The scientists think those white, vein-like growths inside the pit could indicate geologic activity in the "recent past," which still means a few million years ago or so. Dawn's other images also show that Ceres doesn't have as many large impact craters as scientists thought, and that there's one particular crater called Haulani that's composed of different materials than the rest of the dwarf planet...."

Richard

NASA Reveals Stunning New Photos of Dwarf Planet Ceres
By Bill Retherford/ Science/ Forbes/ forbes.com

"Just released by NASA: striking close-ups of the mysterious world Ceres, taken by a robotic probe turned paparazzi.

“These pictures are new to you and new to us too,” says Marc Rayman of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. “It’s a wonderful flood of data.”

Every 27 hours, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft swoops near the surface of Ceres to grab the close-ups. At its lowest point, the probe is only 22 miles up. In outer space, that’s virtually skimming the ground.

The photo shoot started June 9; so far, Dawn has taken “hundreds” of pictures, says Rayman, “exotic alien landscapes, scenes truly otherworldly.”

The images are so new, NASA researchers “haven’t had time to analyze them yet,” he says.



“But it’s almost like we’re seeing a different Ceres.”...."


Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA


The dwarf planet Ceres. This image was taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft from an altitude of 250 miles.


Richard

Here it is July, and...
Someone didn't take down their Christmas lights you can see from space.