The dwarf planet Ceres could have possessed a global, salty ocean, whose remnants are still to be found deep in its interior. Among these, the ruins of a bubble from a liquid Brine, about 40 kilometers below the so-called Occator crater, such as the Max-Planck-Institute for solar system research (MPS) announced in Göttingen.

Thus, the subterranean Brine urged earlier, below the impact crater Occator to the surface and left behind a bright, salt-containing deposits. This process will take probably still. The new findings are based on the analysis of data from the Nasa Mission “Dawn”, the results of the journals “Nature Astronomy”, in “Nature Geoscience” and “Nature Communications” devoted several articles.

NASA recording of the Occator-crater of the space probe “Dawn”.

“Dawn” came to Ceres very close to and discovered the unique world of

Ceres is the largest celestial body, which is almost a thousand kilometers in diameter in the asteroid belt between the planets Mars and Jupiter. The celestial body was discovered in 1801 and is named after the Roman goddess of agriculture.

The spectacular Nasa asteroid mission “Dawn” Ceres sought from 2015 to 2018 from the vicinity. On a highly elliptical orbit, the spacecraft ventured in the last five months of her Mission up to 35 kilometers to the Ceres surface – closer than ever before. The scientific camera system, the “Dawn”probe, which was developed under the leadership of the MPS and built to get unique shots.

The new publications to the “Dawn”of the results of drawing according to the MPS, the picture of a unique world, in the interior, until today, remnants of a global ocean, and its strange icy volcano extremism – the so-called kryovulkan alcoholism – is probably still active. dpa The planet and largest dwarf planet in the solar system

the Old assumptions were apparently wrong

kryovulkan extremism was the MPS that for a long time as a phenomenon in the outer solar system that occurs only on some of the icy moons of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. By fulled by the huge gravitational forces of their parent planets, these moons do not offer in its interior, there is so much heat, that the water freezes in spite of the considerable distance from the sun completely and in a spectacular part of the fountains into space spray.

many of The millions of larger and smaller chunks in the asteroid belt are, however, commonly referred to as simply constructed, water-free and inactive body. Recent publications demonstrate that this view cannot be maintained can.

The authors of the article, which also includes researchers at the westfälische Wilhelms-University (WWU) in Münster and the National Institute of Science Education and Research in Bhubaneswar in India, laid a particular emphasis on the Occator crater. As it turned out, arose from the crater about 22 million years ago by a large impact.

NASA space probe “Dawn”, came the dwarf planet very close to.

still water from Ceres? It is possible

in Front of about seven and a half million years, the Brine from the interior rose to the crater surface of the sea. This activity continued over millions of years – possible even that the dwarf planet is still water leaking and evaporating. “We believe that Ceres kryovulkan is still occasionally active,” said Andreas Nathues from the MPS, the scientific Director of the “Dawn”-camera team.

according to the MPS, there is some evidence that the outbreaks in the early development phase of the Occator-volcanism were partially explosive, is likely to have the Kryovulkan of Ceres but in the meantime, clearly calmed down. The researchers suggest, therefore, that the water will now escape, especially by Evaporation. “Such a Kryovulkan is according to current knowledge in the solar system is unique,” said Nico Schmedemann of the EMU.

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