Just like volcanoes on Earth are filled with lava, this space volcano is filled with ice.
Advertisement
Ceres’s cryovolcano, named Ahuna Mons, is described in an article by Ottaviano Ruesch with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and colleagues. It has been raised by cryovolcanism, a form of low-temperature volcanic activity. According to scientists, the mountain was as a salty-mud volcano instead of molten rocks and it contains of salty water mixed with mud.
Williams is part of a team of scientists working with NASA’s Dawn mission who have published papers in the journal Science this week. Scientists concluded that Ahuna Mons most closely resembles a volcanic dome.
“Ahuna is truly unique, being the only mountain of its kind on Ceres”, he said. “It shows nothing to indicate a tectonic formation, so that led us to consider cryovolcanism as a method for its origin”, said lead researcher Williams.
The recent images are concerned with a so-called ice volcano.
“We’re confident that Ahuna Mons formed within the last billion years, and possibly within a few hundred million years”, Ruesch said.
The team used images and 3-D terrain maps from the Dawn mission to analyze the shape of Ahuna Mons. It confirms that although Ceres’ surface temperature averages nearly -40° (Celsius or Fahrenheit; the scales converge at this temperature), its interior has kept warm enough for liquid water or brines to exist for a relatively long period. Ahuna Mons on Ceres indicates such physical and chemical limitations to volcanism are only apparent.
Dawn’s view of Occator crater on Ceres, home to a collection of intriguing bright spots.
The US space agency NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has spotted “Lonely Mountain” on the dwarf planet.
As per Dawn observations, Ceres has an outer shell that is not purely ice or rock, but a mixture of both. For example, Saturn’s moon Enceladus has fountains of water-ice particles streaming from cracks in the icy crust at its south pole. “It has also evolved geologically”.
“We need to continue studying the data to better understand the interior structure of Ceres”, said Williams. It carries a suite of cameras, spectrometers, and gamma-ray and neutron detectors. It must have formed because ice under the surface pushed the ground above, scientists say.
Advertisement
After Dawn completed its prime mission on 30 June, having surpassed all of its scientific objectives at Vesta and at Ceres, NASA extended the mission to perform new studies of Ceres. What is it about the volcano on the dwarf planet that makes the discovery surprising? This is not the first time that evidence of volcanic activity has been spotted on a wealth of other planets. “This would be an ideal way to end the mission”, said Williams.
