Now just five days away from its close encounter with dwarf planet Pluto, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft beams back the first image to be received since the 4 July anomaly that sent the spacecraft into safe mode, indicating that all systems appear to be functioning normally. The flyby sequence of science observations is officially underway.
A new animated video of dwarf planet Ceres, based on images taken from NASA’s Dawn spacecraft’s first mapping orbit at an altitude of 8,400 miles (13,600 kilometres), as well as the most recent navigational images taken from 3,200 miles (5,100 kilometres), provides a unique perspective of this heavily cratered, mysterious world.
The enigmatic white features on the dwarf planet Ceres are better resolved in a new sequence of images taken by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft on May 3rd and 4th. In this closest-yet view, the brightest spots within a crater in the northern hemisphere are revealed to be composed of many smaller spots. However, their exact nature remains unknown.
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