What has #NASA"s #Dawn spacecraft cooked up for us this time? More awe-inspiring pictures of #Ceres... - http://clapway.com/2015/09/10/dawn-pictures-of-ceres123/

Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt, has been the focus of NASA’s Dawn spacecraft for some time now. The dwarf planet, which lies between Mars and Jupiter, is the thirty-third largest known body in the Solar System and the only one that circuits entirely within Neptune’s orbit.

Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA

Today, the Dawn space probe, launched by NASA back in 2007, continues to keep its eye on the celestial body. Recently, it sent back the clearest photos of Ceres to date, nearly three times the resolution of the images the probe snapped in June, when it was orbiting 2,700 miles above the surface of Ceres. These new photos, taken at an altitude of 915 miles, depict Ceres’ Occator impact crater like never before, revealing – yet again – the mysterious bright spots that characterize the dwarf planet.

DAWN SPACE PROBE SHEDS LIGHT ON CERES

To this day, scientists are still uncertain of what exactly is causing these bright spots; so far, volcanoes, salt deposits and even ice geysers have been offered as possible hypotheses, according to the Huffington Post. However, regardless of where they’ve enigmatically spawn from, space enthusiasts can all agree that the bright spots make for some captivating photographs, as Marc Rayman, Dawn’s chief engineer and mission director suggests:

“Dawn has transformed what was so recently a few bright dots into a complex and beautiful, gleaming landscape.”

WHAT’S NEXT FOR THE DAWN SPACECRAFT AND CERES

Over the course of the next two months, everyone can expect to see and hear much more about Dawn. For the time being, the space craft has kept itself busy mapping all of Ceres; it has already completed two 11-day cycles, each consisting of 14 orbits, and recently began its third on September 9. Dawn will complete this procedure six more times, which will ultimately allow scientists to construct 3D maps of the dwarf planet. Each cycle, in the meantime, helps to captures a slightly different viewing angle to aid in the construction, according to NASA.

“Soon, the scientific analysis will reveal the geological and chemical nature of this mysterious and mesmerizing extraterrestrial scenery,” Rayman said.

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Dawn Sends Back Even Better Pictures of Ceres

Dawn Spacecraft Takes Best Pictures of Ceres Yet #Ceres #DawnSpacecraft #NASA - http://clapway.com/2015/08/26/nasa-dawn-spacecraft-ceres123/

NASA has released stunning new images taken by its Dawn spacecraft of Ceres, providing the closest pictures of the dwarf planet ever. And, the “Lonely Mountain” – NASA’s nickname for a four-mile-tall mountain on the planet’s surface – can be seen in unprecedented detail.

The photos were taken at an altitude of 915 miles above the planet, a distance at which Dawn will stay for two months until it has mapped the planet six times. This distance is significantly closer to the planet than the 3,200 altitude that Dawn first took pictures from. And in October, Dawn will get even closer to Ceres when it maps it from a mere 320 mile altitude. As The Economic Times pointed out, NASA scientists are improving their measurements of the dwarf planet’s gravity field to prepare for the upcoming orbit.

You can check out all of the photos, which were shot at a resolution of 450 feet per pixel, at NASA’s website.

AMBITIOUS EXPLORATION

In a statement, the Dawn mission director and chief engineer Marc Rayman said “Dawn is performing flawlessly in this new orbit as it conducts its ambitious exploration. The spacecraft’s view is now three times as sharp as in its previous mapping orbit, revealing exciting new details of this intriguing dwarf planet.”

As CNET pointed out, NASA scientists are using the photographs, along with an infrared and visible mapping spectrometer, to study the dwarf planet’s surface minerals.

MORE ON CERES

According to the Orlando Sentinel, Ceres has a diameter of about 598 miles and first became known to astronomers in 1801. The massive pyramid-shaped mountain (which as Phil Plait pointed out at Slate could also be called “Mt. Doom” or “Mount Seleya”) has been visualized by NASA in a tour of the mountain animated with CGI. Along with Ceres’ bright spots, the mountain has been a source of intrigue and fascination to many scientists.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF DAWN

Dawn, which was first launched by NASA in 2007, arrived in Ceres orbit in March 2015. Before it started mapping Ceres, Dawn spent more than a year observing the proto-planet Vesta.

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Dawn Spacecraft Takes Best Pictures of Ceres Yet

Dwarf Planet Ceres to Bare All For Dawn - http://clapway.com/2015/08/09/dwarf-planet-ceres-to-bare-all-for-dawn-101/

At this very moment, NASA’S Dawn Spacecraft is closing in on the dwarf planet Ceres, which meeks out its lonely existence out in the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter, that ring slowly spinning beyond the inner planets’ orbits, separating us from the gas giants, the oort cloud, and that vast emptiness beyond. However, Dawn’s approach of Ceres has already been so Chock Full of odd surprises that astronomers are unsure what to make of the dwarf planet.

DWARF PLANET, GIANT MYSTERIES

For starters, NASA aired a video last Thursday limning a bizarre and vibrant glowing and shining series of streaks flying across the slant of a massive pyramid-shaped mountain.

This big mountain is so gigantic that, measuring in at 20,000 feet, it easily overshadows Alaska’s Mount McKinley. Marc Rayman, director of the Dawn Mission, commented that an amalgam of scientists are still attempting to explain what these glowing streaks are, in addition to two more similarly glowing spots that are also inside the giant crater.

But astronomers hope that as Ceres grows larger in Dawn’s eyes we will get a feed of enhanced imagery of the bizarre glowing dwarf world. So far, NASA has collected the most recent images of Ceres’ surface into a Youtube video from the lowest altitudes yet achieved.

CERES’ HISTORY

The dwarf planet Ceres predates most other phenomena in the solar system, estimated to have ceased all significant changes over 4 billion years ago. The dwarf planet is also the largest known object between Jupiter and Mars, and could potentially answer many questions about how the solar system formed.

WHY DOES THIS DWARF PLANET GLOW?

Many scientists have leveled to the media that the spectacular glowing visible on the dwarf planet’s surface is caused by ice. But Ceres’ albedo, which is the fraction of light a planet’s surface reflects back into space, is known to be a bit stochastic and unreliable. Whatever is really going on down there will have to wait until Dawn gets close enough to the dwarf planet to find out, which is slated for this Fall.

Chris Russell, the principal investigator at the University of California in LA, says that his team will work hard to gather the data needed to legitimize their theories concerning the dwarf planet’s mysterious glowing. Russell explained that their plan is to snap newer, high resolution images throughout the mission’s following orbital phase, in order to compare these glowing spots’ reflective salt properties.

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Dwarf Planet Ceres to Bare All For Dawn

As if space didn"t have enough mysteries, this mountain shows up. - http://clapway.com/2015/06/22/odd-mountain-on-ceres-adds-to-the-dwarf-planets-mysteries-125/

New photos from NASA show a huge mountain on Ceres—a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. This is just the latest mystery to emerge on this fascinating and perplexing world.

A LONE MOUNTAIN

The photo showing the unusual mountain was taken by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft on June 6, 2015. This pyramid-shaped mountain on Ceres rises out of what appears to be relatively smooth terrain. According to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), this mountain rises approximately three miles above the surface.

THOSE MYSTERIOUS SPOTS

Dawn also snapped closer photos of the bright mysterious spots on Ceres’ surface that have perplexed scientists. But the new photos don’t provide any new clues to help definitively identify them.

The strange illuminated area on Ceres was photographed by Dawn before the spacecraft entered orbit in March 2015, which is comprised of two bright spots within a basin on the surface. Speculation about the source of these odd lights began immediately after Dawn’s photos were published by NASA. Perplexed scientists suggested light reflections off ice or water vapor, or a volcano as possible explanations. And others presented the possibility that the illumination could be from an extraterrestrial civilization.

The mystery remains. And, until Dawn can get a better look, NASA actually launched a website inviting public suppositions regarding the bright spot on Ceres.

A CLOSER LOOK

The recent images of Ceres were taken by Dawn from 2,700 miles above the planet. The spacecraft is scheduled to maneuver down to 900 miles above the planet in August 2015. The closer approach will hopefully yield even better photos and give scientists a better idea about what is causing those weird bright spots.

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Odd Mountain on Ceres Adds to the Dwarf Planet"s Mysteries