Posted on 12/11/2015 3:57:39 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Explanation: Dwarf planet Ceres is the largest object in the Solar System's main asteroid belt with a diameter of about 950 kilometers. Exploring Ceres from orbit since March, the Dawn spacecraft's camera has revealed about 130 or so mysterious bright spots, mostly associated with impact craters scattered around the small world's otherwise dark surface. The brightest one is near the center of the 90 kilometer wide Occator Crater, seen in this dramatic false color view combining near-infrared and visible light image data. A study now finds the bright spot's reflected light properties are probably most consistent with a type of magnesium sulfate called hexahydrite. Of course, magnesium sulfate is also known to Earth dwellers as epsom salt. Haze reported inside Occator also suggests the salty material could be left over as a mix of salt and water-ice sublimates on the surface. Since impacts would have exposed the material, Ceres' numerous and widely scattered bright spots may indicate the presence of a subsurface shell of ice-salt mix. In mid-December, Dawn will begin taking observations from its closest Ceres mapping orbit.
(Excerpt) Read more at 129.164.179.22 ...
[Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, UCLA, MPS/DLR/IDA]
Its a pucker hole.
Nice pic of the impact crater on Ceres, the "bright spot" which was so "mysterious". :')
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Swimmin’ pool.
There’s always a bright spot.
Thanks for posting this APOD.
It is amazing how different things appear and become in such extreme environments.
What we know, what we have found about our Universe is like the visible part of the spectrum compared to the entire spectrum of radiation.
The night is darkest just before a big rock from space produces a massive fireball, huge crater, and a spray of smaller craters from ejecta. But of course, through the years, the old saying has been whittled down a little.
If everyone were an astronomer, and each specialized in a unique section of the sky, we’d never be able to learn more than a tiny fraction. So there’s a lot of growth opportunities and job security in the field. ;’)
By this do you mean, we might all be saved by the same thing that wiped out the dinosaurs?
By that I mean, optimism is rarely warranted.
If we assigned one person to each star in JUST our galaxy, we would run out of people before we ran out of stars.
So there's a lot of growth opportunities and job security in the field.
Only if we can keep Islam from taking over the planet.
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