The world is buzzing with Pluto right now, but what about Ceres?
Let’s give Ceres some love!
Hey all, Amy here, talking space with you on DNews today, and specifically, the other
little planet we’re currently learning a more about almost every day.
When Ceres was first discovered, it was a planet.
Then it was reclassified as an asteroid.
Now, it’s considered a dwarf planet.
But NASA’s Dawn mission is revealing the world to be increasingly interesting.
By now we’re all pretty familiar with Ceres’ spots.
When Dawn was about 29,000 miles away from Ceres, images revealed two bright spots on
the surface.
Since the spacecraft has settled into orbit around Ceres, better imagery showed that the
two spots are actually two of a dozen or so in the area.
What’s more, they have different temperatures, one being warmer than its surrounding terrain
and the other being colder.
There was also the interesting discovery of what looked like plumes.
Imaging along the terminator, that is, the side of the dwarf planets just passing from
day to night, Dawn found what looked like jets of ice shooting out of the planet’s
subsurface, glowing in reflected sunlight.
And it just keeps getting weirder.
The latest, as reported in Nature last week, is that the bright spots seem to be producing
a haze.
But not a planet-wide haze, just a localized haze, which is pretty interesting.
And it only shows up when seen from certain angles at noon local time on Ceres.
It comes back in a regular patterns, covering half the crater before stopping at the rim.
But that’s not all that’s catching scientists’ attention.
There are mountains on Ceres!
Not huge ones - they’re about 3 miles high - but it’s still evidence of something actively
shaping the little world in its past!
And we’ve learned that Ceres is a little smaller than expected and its axis is tilted
at the reverse angle that scientists expected meaning that on Ceres, summer is winter and
winter is summer!
So what does all this mean?
It means there’s a lot more to learn about the little dwarf planet, and what we learn
will ultimately help scientists get a better grasp on how all the bodies in the solar system
are related.
Ceres is too big to be an asteroid but also stuck in the nebulous dwarf planet category.
Learning more about Ceres might help us call it by the right name.
And speaking of planets turned dwarf planets, are you curious about Pluto’s status as
a planet?
I dug into this one on my own channel, Vintage Space