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It has been suggested that a remnant layer of liquid water (or muddy ocean) may have survived to the present under a layer of ice. [28] [29] Measurements taken by Dawn confirm that Ceres is partially differentiated and has a shape in hydrostatic equilibrium, the smallest equilibrium body known. [30]
This ocean should have left an icy layer under the surface as it froze. The fact that Dawn found no evidence of such a layer suggests that Ceres's original crust was at least partially destroyed by later impacts thoroughly mixing the ice with the salts and silicate-rich material of the ancient seafloor and the material beneath. [64]
There are indications that Ceres may have a tenuous atmosphere and water frost on the surface. Surface water ice is unstable at distances less than 5 AU from the Sun, so it is expected to vaporize if it is exposed directly to solar radiation. Water ice can migrate from the deep layers of Ceres to the surface, but escapes in a very short time.
A new study reveals some fascinating insights into an ice volcano on the dwarf planet Ceres. The volcano Ahuna Mons is about 13,000 feet tall and 11 miles wide which is particularly impressive ...
Ceres, the only dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, has a thin water-vapor atmosphere. [42] [43] The vapor is likely the result of impacts of meteorites containing ice, but there is hardly an atmosphere besides said vapor. [44] Nevertheless, the presence of water had led to speculation that life may be possible there.
Ceres displays such evidence of an active geology as salt deposits and cryovolcanos, while Pluto has water-ice mountains drifting in nitrogen-ice glaciers, as well as a significant atmosphere. Ceres evidently has brine percolating through its subsurface, while there is evidence that Pluto has an actual subsurface ocean.
The asteroid belt is the smallest and innermost known circumstellar disc in the Solar System. Classes of small Solar System bodies in other regions are the near-Earth objects, the centaurs, the Kuiper belt objects, the scattered disc objects, the sednoids, and the Oort cloud objects. About 60% of the main belt mass is contained in the four ...
Craters. Ceres is saturated with impact craters.Many have a central pit or bright spot. In the first batch of 17 names approved by the IAU, craters north of 20° north latitude had names beginning with A–G (with Asari being the furthest north), those between 20° north and south latitude beginning with H–R, and those further south beginning with S–Z (with Zadeni being the furthest south).