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Ceres (minor-planet designation: 1 Ceres) is a dwarf planet in the middle main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. It was the first known asteroid , discovered on 1 January 1801 by Giuseppe Piazzi at Palermo Astronomical Observatory in Sicily , and announced as a new planet .
Dawn is a retired space probe that was launched by NASA in September 2007 with the mission of studying two of the three known protoplanets of the asteroid belt: Vesta and Ceres. [1] In the fulfillment of that mission—the ninth in NASA's Discovery Program — Dawn entered orbit around Vesta on July 16, 2011, and completed a 14-month survey ...
In September 2007, the Dawn spacecraft launched on a mission from Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 17 [8] on a mission to explore two of the three largest bodies in the asteroid belt, 4 Vesta and 1 Ceres. After nearly four years, Dawn entered orbit around Vesta on July 16, 2011.
The asteroid Ceres, once thought to be just a large rock orbiting between Mars and Jupiter, has slushy volcanoes and liquid saltwater beneath its surface that may have formed an underground ocean ...
The Dawn spacecraft has spotted not one, but two bright points on the minor planet Ceres. Newly enhanced images from the probe show two shining spots on the surface. It's not clear exactly what ...
The largest asteroids with an accurately measured mass, because they have been studied by the probe Dawn, are 1 Ceres with a mass of (939.3 ± 0.5) × 10 18 kg, and 4 Vesta at (259.076 ± 0.001) × 10 18 kg. The third-largest asteroid with an accurately measured mass, because it has moons, is 87 Sylvia at (14.76 ± 0.06) × 10 18 kg.
Space probe broke orbit on 5 September 2012 and headed to Ceres; first "big four" asteroid visited by a spacecraft, largest asteroid visited by a spacecraft at the time. 4179 Toutatis: 2.45: 1934 Chang'e 2: 2012 3.2 0.70 Flyby; [1] closest asteroid flyby, first asteroid visited by a Chinese probe. 1 Ceres: 939.4 1801 Dawn: 2015–2018: 35 0.07
NASA's Dawn mission is a mission in NASA's Discovery Program. Dawn orbited and explored the giant protoplanet Vesta in 2011-2012, and now it is in orbit and exploring a second new world, dwarf ...