Nasa's Dawn Spacecraft Takes Photos of Ceres En Route to Dwarf Planet

Advertisement
By Indo-Asian News Service | Updated: 20 January 2015 13:06 IST
Nasa's Dawn Spacecraft Takes Photos of Ceres En Route to Dwarf Planet
Nasa's Dawn spacecraft has delivered stunning images of Ceres, the dwarf planet in the main asteroid belt which lies between Mars and Jupiter.

It has an average diameter of 950km and is thought to contain a large amount of ice.

Some scientists think it is possible that the surface conceals an ocean.

"We know so much about the solar system and yet so little about dwarf planet Ceres. Now, Dawn is ready to change that," said Marc Rayman, Dawn's chief engineer and mission director at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

New images show the dwarf planet at 27 pixels across, about three times better than the calibration images taken in early December.

Advertisement

The best images of Ceres so far were taken by Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope in 2003 and 2004.

This most recent images from Dawn, taken January 13 this year at about 80 percent of Hubble resolution, were not quite as sharp.

Advertisement

Over the next several weeks, Dawn will deliver increasingly better images of the dwarf planet, leading up to the spacecraft's capture into orbit around Ceres on March 6.

The images will continue to improve as the spacecraft spirals closer to the surface during its 16-month study of the dwarf planet.

Advertisement

"Already, the (latest) images hint at first surface structures such as craters," said Andreas Nathues, lead investigator for the framing camera team at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Gottingen, Germany.

Dawn's arrival at Ceres will mark the first time a spacecraft has ever visited a dwarf planet.

The spacecraft has already delivered more than 30,000 images and many insights about Vesta, the second most massive body in the asteroid belt.

 

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.

Further reading: Ceres, Nasa
Advertisement

Related Stories

Popular Mobile Brands
  1. Amazon Great Freedom Festival 2025 Sale to Kick Off in India on This Date
  2. iQOO Z10 Turbo+ Officially Confirmed to Run on This Chipset
  3. Huawei Band 10 Review
  4. Oppo Reno 14 5G Now Available in India in New Mint Green Colourway
  1. Meta Names ChatGPT Co-Creator Shengjia Zhao as Chief Scientist of Superintelligence Lab
  2. Who-Fi: An AI-Powered Wi-Fi Technology That Can Identify and Track Individuals Without Cameras
  3. NASA’s X-59 Moves Closer to First Flight with Advanced Taxi Tests and Augmented Vision
  4. Unusual Plasma Waves Above Jupiter’s North Pole Can Possibly Be Explained
  5. NASA to Live Stream SpaceX Crew-11 Launch Docking, Know How to Watch Online
  6. Apple Expands App Store Age Rating System With More Granular Categories
  7. Amazon Kindle Colorsoft Kids With 7-Inch Display and a Kid-Friendly Cover Launched
  8. Dying Light: The Beast Delayed to September for 'Extra Polishing Work'
  9. Flipkart Freedom Sale 2025 Date Revealed; Plus, VIP Members To Get Early Access
  10. Huawei Mate XT 2 Colour Options Leaked; Could Be World’s Second Mass-Produced Tri-Fold Phone
Gadgets 360 is available in
Download Our Apps
Available in Hindi
© Copyright Red Pixels Ventures Limited 2025. All rights reserved.