The Sky Tonight

December 11, 2015

Dwarf planet Ceres: water vapor in Occator crater
Lindau, Germany (SPX) Dec 11, 2015
When the Sun shines into the Occator crater on the surface of the dwarf planet Ceres, a kind of thin haze appears above its brightest spot. This can be seen in images taken by the camera system aboard NASA's Dawn space probe, which researchers under the lead of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research published on 9 December, 2015 in Nature magazine. The haze indicates that frozen water may exist near the surface . The bright spots in the Occator crater likely contain magnesium sulphates ... read more

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