Posted on 01/20/2015 3:23:34 PM PST by BenLurkin
One of the most anticipated aspects the Dawn spacecraft being in orbit around Ceres HAS to be finding out what this spot is. It could be ice, it could be a cryovolcano or geysers, or it could be something else. But we do know fairly certain that it is a real feature and not an image artifact, since it shows up in most of the recent Hubble images and now the Dawn images.
Planetary scientists have long suspected that water ice may be buried under Cere’s crust. A few things point to subsurface ice: the density of Ceres is less than that of the Earth’s crust, and because the surface bears spectral evidence of water-bearing minerals. Scientists estimate that if Ceres were composed of 25 percent water, it may have more water than all the fresh water on Earth. Ceres’ water, unlike Earth’s, would be in the form of water ice and located in the mantle, which wraps around the asteroid’s solid core.
And then last year, the Herschel space telescope discovered water vapor around Ceres, and the vapor could be emanating from water plumes — much like those that are on Saturn’s moon Enceladus – or it could be from cryovolcanism from geysers or icy volcano. Without huge planet or satellite nearby tugging on it, the mechanism for how Ceres is active is also intriguing.
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
Is a white spot the opposite of a black hole?
TO #7. Re “My God, its full of stars”.
So is Hollywood and it is basically a “monolith” of liberal Marxism and fake people (similar to the movie about a fake landing on Mars).
If NASA wants to see if there is life in outer space (I didn’t say “intelligent”), all they have to do is to go to Hollyweird (as in “Men and Black”, the secret operation site) and they will have their theories confirmed.
Just look at Michael Moore (from the planet “Blowfish”), Rosie O’Donnell, from the water-planet “Waterworld”, and Al Sharpton, from the planet “Matrix Redux”, and you will know that they are alien forms of life.
Our DNA sequencing can’t produce things like them.
A white spot on Ceres...Bill Clinton was here.
It looks like a sinkhole filled with gas, methane perhaps, or ice. If not a collapsed cave root, it could be a crater in the surface caused by an asteroid strike.
Leprosy?
80 and going strong, SOMEWHERE!
There was a very short-lived SciFi spoof show that had Elvis living in a trailer park or in the woods.
Who knows?
PS: I have two Donruss? trading cards cards with pieces of Elvis’ performance shirt (white with dark blue polka-dots and one from a pair of his pajamas), plus autographs from two of his movie stars, Nancy Sinatra and Yvonne Craig (the Green Woman of Star Trek), plus from one of his band members
I also have his “Christmas Album” as an LP. Really good. The man had talent.
well played
Nice!
Now it looks even more like a fully operational Deathstar.
Fresh impact, last few 100,000 years. Extra to APoD.
Astronomy Picture of the Day — Approaching Asteroid Ceres
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3248685/posts?page=7#7
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3248685/posts?page=13#13
Is the poet sure it wasn’t a moose bit his sister?
WOW, lucky you!!
Yeah, I agree, Elvis had talent, may he rest in peace!
What is it?
XKCD is all over it this morning.
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