The paper is an overview of dawn mission that is designed to study two large bodies in the asteroid belt: Vesta and Ceres. The dawn mission journeys to the center of the main asteroid belt to orbit and explore the two most massive main belt asteroids, Vesta and Ceres. Dawn aims to increase or understanding not just of the present state of these two bodies, but also of the conditions during the time of their formation. It attempts this through achieving a set of measurement objectives in which the physical properties of these asteroids such as mass, slopes, size, density, and spin state are accurately determined, and in which the mineralogical and elemental composition of the surface and near-surface material are probed. Dawn employs ion propulsion technology to enable a modestly-sized launcher to start a moderately-sized spacecraft on its journey, to not only reach the two massive asteroids but also to orbit them, descending to near the surface. They both have survived largely intact through the collisional history of the solar system. Furthermore, evidence shows that each has …show more content…
2.34 AU) and if there was little migration during the initial stages of formation, this body should be cooler and more primitive, all else being equal. However, all else cannot be equal because Ceres is clearly a wet planet, containing hydrated minerals, contrasting sharply with the dry basaltic surface of Vasta. Keeping water on Ceres is not easy. While Ceres is bigger, it releases more gravitational energy during accretion. If it formed contemporaneously with Vesta it too should have gathered radionuclides, and would become even hotter than Vesta, but Ceres did not proceed in this way. (Reference 5, 6)
2.2 The Discovery of the Asteroid Belt The discovery of the asteroid belt was a direct outgrowth of our understanding (or
Astronomers have identified plenty of objects that were circulating the sun farther away from Neptune since the year 1992. According to research, there are more than 70,000 of these small objects named as Trans-Neptunians, which had a diameter that was larger than 100 km. Also, these objects extended from Neptune’s orbit from 30 astronomical units (AU) to 50 astronomical units. There is a thick band in which these Trans-Neptunians were restricted in and this ring was named as the Kuiper Belt. One may ponder what is the significance of the Kuiper Belt? Astronomers believe that the objects within the Kuiper Belt may be the ancient remains from the early stages of development of the solar system.
19. What is the scientific method, and how does it relate to the science of astronomy?
Man seems, by nature, to be a curious creature. We are always looking for explanations for natural phenomena. We have attributed the sound of thunder and lightning in the sky to Thor.
In February of 1999 NASA launched a robotic probe into space, of 300 kilograms, under the name Stardust. Stardust’s primary mission was to collect dust samples from the coma of comet wild 2 and comet and interstellar dust for analysis in Earth labs and to return as many high-resolution images of the comet coma and nucleus as possible. Comets are small, frozen and icy bodies that when passing by the sun, warm up and begin to release gases. This releasing of gases often form the visible part of the comet, the coma, which is simply the enveloped gases around the nucleus of the comet, which is the central part of a comet composed of rock, dust, and frozen gases in a solid form. Comas, are generally made up of mostly ice and comet dust. It is
I want to be in the Anderson Scholars Science program because I want to get better at science and do more in-depth research. The internship in the program sounds like a great experience for me, and the research project seems like it would be good to do some real research and fun to do. I will contribute to the Anderson Scholars by going to all of the field trips and science seminars. I will get good grades in my science classes and take AP science classes. I will work hard to become a good scientist. One of the things I hope to gain from this program is some experience on what its like to be a scientist doing research that isn’t just a premade lab. The Anderson Scholars program can give me the opportunity to find out what areas of science
Viewed from a distance there appeared to be a shining beacon coming from Ceres that mesmerized scientist, the beautiful glow turned out to be a complex reflective material in a 57-mile crater called “Occator”. It is thought that following the huge impact that formed the crater, underground briny salt water came up to
The rings of Saturn are more spectacular than those of any other planet. Although this planet’s rings are very wide, extending from the top of its atmosphere to well beyond the orbits of its closest moons, they are very thin, measuring no more than a few kilometers (about a mile) in thickness (“Great Space Place”). The Pioneer 11 flyby made several discoveries about the rings. The rings are made of
On April 9, 1998, Cornell University astrophysicist Martin Harwit published his discovery of the presence of massive amounts of water in the Orion Nebula. This was the first time that water has been found in a star-forming region. The find demonstrates that water plays a vital role in star formation. In addition, this discovery implies that water is prevalent in space. Harwit speculates that the water acts as a coolant, by carrying heat away from the condensing clouds. It is believed that this process is necessary to slow down the particles in order to allow the compression of the particles into new stars. 6
was forming it was a giant ball made of liquid molten. Over a long period of time asteroids hit
Humans have longed to believe in extrasolar planets, as surely there have to be planets elsewhere in the universe. Claims of supposedly discovered extrasolar planets can be dated back to 1855 when Captain S. W. Jacobs from the Madras observatory, claimed that he had discovered a planet orbiting a binary system (Jacobs 1855), all the way up until 1991 when a team of astronomers announced then retracted the alleged discovery of an extrasolar planet around a pulsar star (Lyne and Bailes 1992). Planets are extremely hard to detect as they are a very faint light source and the light from its parent star is much brighter and essentially blocks out light from a planet (Winters 1996). It was not until 1992 when the first exoplanets were confirmed
NASA contributed to a number of successes in American history. During the past, the organization has rapidly acquired a number changes that has created an opportunity to expand and improve Knowledge Management (KM). Similar to many other important organizations, NASA has frequently pursued ways to capture knowledge into their information systems assuming that it could be managed best when it 's captured in a system for later retrieval. In the past 10 years, the budgets on their missions have been reduced, missions have multiplied ten-fold, and scientists and engineers have been overwhelmed by the extreme challenges. The most important factors that are addressed includes the importance of learning, (FBC) faster, better, cheaper implications, and knowledge management that supports innovation in the future.
"A planet is a celestial body that revolves around a central star and does not shine by its own light " (Grolier, 1992). The only planetary system that is known to man is our
Since ancient times, the universe had captivated people’s imagination and curiosity. With the limitation on technology, early sky watchers were only capable of classifying objects they observed as either a star or a planet. During the twentieth century, with advancement in telescopes to see further into space with more accurate details, scientists were able to find numerous stars and planet like objects within the solar system. Scientists had no trouble classifying objects such as Uranus and Neptune as planets. However, the real trouble came when they discovered a planetary object called Ceres. Objects like Ceres and Pluto behaved similarly to regular planets. Because of the limitations on the technology at the time, it was very difficult
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and by far the largest mass object in the solar system of all the other planets. Jupiter is twice the size of all the other planets combined. It is as 318 times the sizes of earth. The distance that Jupiter orbits the sun is 778,330,000 km (Gallant pp154). The diameter is 142,984 km and the mass that it has is 1.900e27 kg. Jupiter is the fourth brightest object in the sky after the Sun, the Moon and Venus. Mars is some times brighter. Galileo discovered Jupiter in 1610(Gallant); another interesting fact is that Jupiter has 4 large moons. Which are known as the Galilean moons. They were named Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. The first mission that went to Jupiter was Pioneer 10 in 1973 and later
Many people who live on Earth are close minded to what is really out there in the universe. They cannot even begin to fathom the vastness of it and how Earth is just a tiny little speck compared to everything else out there. From the planets to the stars and out towards the edge of the unknown, we can only see what science provides us with. From this, we know that we are nothing but a tiny planet located in a solar system of millions in a galaxy of many more in the universe.