This image is one of several NASA’s Dawn spacecraft took on approach to Ceres on 4th February 2015 at a distance of about 90,000 miles (145,000 kilometres) from the dwarf planet. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDANASA’s Dawn spacecraft, on approach to dwarf planet Ceres, has acquired its latest and closest-yet snapshots of this mysterious world. The images of Ceres were taken on 4th February 2015 from a distance of about 90,000 miles (145,000 kilometres).
At a resolution of 8.5 miles (14 kilometres) per pixel, the pictures represent the sharpest images to date of Ceres.This animation showcases a series of images obtained with the Framing Camera of NASA’s Dawn spacecraft on approach to Ceres on 4th February 2015 at a distance of about 90,000 miles (145,000 kilometres) from the dwarf planet. The resolution is 8.5 miles (14 kilometers) per pixel. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDAAfter the spacecraft arrives and enters into orbit around the dwarf planet, it will study the intriguing world in great detail. Ceres, with a diameter of 590 miles (950 kilometres), is the largest object in the main asteroid belt, located between Mars and Jupiter.
Several recent news stories have reported that a mysterious anomaly in the orbit of NASA’s Cassini spacecraft around Saturn could potentially be explained by the gravitational tug of theorised Planet 9, existing far beyond the orbit of Neptune in our solar system. However, NASA cannot find any unexplained deviations in the spacecraft’s orbit.
Pluto is thought to possess a subsurface ocean, which is not so much a sign of water as it is a tremendous clue that other dwarf planets in deep space also may contain similarly exotic oceans, naturally leading to the question of life, said one co-investigator with NASA’s New Horizon.
