Ceres' Mystery Bright Dots May Have Volcanic Origin

astroengine writes As NASA's Dawn mission slowly spirals in on its dwarf planet target, Ceres' alien landscape is becoming sharper by the day. And, at a distance of only 29,000 miles (46,000 kilometers), the robotic spacecraft has revealed multiple bright patches on the surface, but one of the brightest spots has revealed a dimmer bright patch right next door. "Ceres' bright spot can now be seen to have a companion of lesser brightness, but apparently in the same basin," said Chris Russell, of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and principal investigator for the Dawn mission. "This may be pointing to a volcano-like origin of the spots, but we will have to wait for better resolution before we can make such geologic interpretations."

Martians went the wrong way

[turkeydance]

and crashed. http://news.discovery.com/spac... [discovery.com]

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[Applehu Akbar]

"OMGWTFBBQ"
Let me guess: this was the gender orientation of the politically hypercorrect journotards covering Rosetta in that epic news conference last summer?

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[Maritz]

That chip on your shoulder. You shouldn't make it quite so obvious.

Space Sharks With Lasers

[cruff]

The space sharks are trying to destroy Dawn before it can get too close to image their civilization.

Why only Pluto is getting the love?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm 222 years old and as far as I'm concerned Ceres is still a planet.

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[Tablizer]

I'm 222 years old and as far as I'm concerned Ceres is still a planet.

I'm 4,000 years old, and as far as I'm concerned, Earth is still flat. You newfangled roundies have it all wrong. You are projecting your own image onto earth, you sedentary belly blobs.

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[kolbe]

I bet you guys look at a crescent moon you think it's caused by the earth's shadow.

It is caused by the earth's shadow... during a lunar eclipse.

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[Tablizer]

Shadow of a giant turtle in its shell.

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[rubycodez]

it now considered "Ceres, the dwarf planet formerly classified as an asteroid, except in the IAU where it formerly was a minor planet and small solar system body"

Premature Eguessulation

[Tablizer]

Shouldn't we wait until the probe actually arrives and gets details before speculating?

There are bright spots on Ganymede (Jupiter moon) that are probably from meteors smashing into its icy surface.

Even our moon has Tycho crater which is surrounded with bright dust due to the recency of the impact. (Radiation tends to darken soil and rocks over time.) Volcano claims are premature.

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[Anonymous Coward]

There is no reason we should not be speculating now. Actually, we should be. This is a great time to be speculating about possible ways these areas could have formed, and what types of evidence for or against we should look for as the probe gets closer to support or dismiss our speculations. It lets us focus our efforts on what will give us the most bang for the buck once we get into orbit.

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[Tablizer]

I have no problem with private speculation, it's just premature to publish it when soon we'll have much better info.

Birkeland Currents Frequently Come in Pairs

[Chris Reeve]

Perhaps it is the correct time to remind people that in the plasma laboratory, current-carrying filaments tend to exhibit both long-range attraction and short-range repulsion. Setting the scientific framework's needs aside for a moment, that would seem to point more logically to an electrical inference. Note that we see a similar dipolar structure at the poles of Venus as well.

The key test will be to observe whether or not they rotate around one another.

If they do, then it's time for Slashdot to en

Wait a second...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's no dwarf planet.

Concerning a hypothesis about light spots on Ceres

[Geoffrey.landis]

Dimpled spinning ball

ice in bottoms of craters

glints bright in sunlight.

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[Shooter6947]

I do believe you have won the comments section for this article ;). Thanks to everyone else for playing!

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[Maritz]

If we all woke up to what alternative thinking on the universe has been telling us for quite some time, we wouldn't have a lost century in the understanding of our universe, and we could stop wasting so much research grants on finding pixie dust in the cosmos.

Cool - what has alternative thinking been telling us? I think I missed that memo. Does it involve tin foil in any way?

I'm not saying it's aliens, but it's aliens...

[MetricT]

When I was younger, I remember reading a sci-fi novel about aliens in our solar system who were overseeing mankind's growth.

The aliens chose their base on Ceres because the asteroid field offered nigh-unlimited resources outside the confines of a gravity well, because Ceres had water for living and powering fusion engines, and because it was far enough away from earth to stay out of sight.

While those two white spots *could* be an example of cryovolcanism, I think that we can all agree that ancient abandoned