Dwarf planet Ceres has reservoirs of salty water under surface
WASHINGTON: Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, is an “ocean world” with a big reservoir of salty water under its frigid surface, scientists said in findings that raise interest in this dwarf planet as a possible outpost for life.
Research published on Monday based on data obtained by NASA’S Dawn spacecraft, which flew as close as 35km from the surface in 2018, provides a new understanding of
Ceres, including evidence indicating it remains geologically active with cryovolcanism volcanoes oozing icy material.
The findings confirm the presence of a subsurface reservoir of brine - salt-enriched water - remnants of a vast subsurface ocean that has been gradually freezing.
“This elevates Ceres to ‘ocean world’ status, noting that this category does not require the ocean to be global,” said planetary scientist and Dawn principal investigator Carol Raymond. “What matters most is that there is liquid on a large scale.” Ceres has a diameter of about 950km. The scientists focused on the 92-km-wide Occator Crater, formed by an impact about 22 million years ago in Ceres’ northern hemisphere. It has two bright areas - salt crusts left by liquid that percolated up to the surface and evaporated.
The liquid, they concluded, originated in a brine reservoir lurking about 40km below the surface. The research was published in the Nature Astronomy, Nature Geoscience and Nature Communications journals.