Close-Up Flyover Of The Mysterious Bright Spots On Ceres

Given the shape, dispersal and location i would actually go with something more like a rare element or radioactive ore that is simply glowing because of exposure to extremely low temperatures. What's interesting is the question of whether or not its something new or just something we know but in a large abundance like platinum or radon.

a reply to: Thorneblood

It would be possible for a radioactive source to cause fluorescence of some molecules close to the surface, or for a cold cathode fluorescence if there is an electric field. Whether the Dawn instruments could isolate the spectral lines, and thus determine the gas molecules that were glowing, I'm not sure, but I don't think so. It would need much finer spectral resolution than the filters can deliver, though by 'mixing and matching' filters, they may have a chance. The filters then, for the VIR instrument, were designed for detecting the 'colour fingerprints' of rock-forming minerals on the surface. An Optical Spectrum Analyzer would seem to be required, but I don't think one has been used on space missions. I think I have my facts straight here, sure someone will let me know if I'm miles from the truth.

This is so cool, it is hard to stop thinking about it.
One thing noticed, did not see anyone else mention it, but there appears to be a dark area that connects both the large left and right illuminated areas. And they really do seem to have a luminous property all of their own. The new shots, when it gets down to picture perfect levels should be astounding.

originally posted by: Kapusta
Just wanted to throw this out their to give a better perspective on these spots and maybe spark some new though on what exactly they might be .

My Theory is that it's possible snow or Ice ?

anyone else ?


Kap.

Is it possible that the bright spots are a heat signature? That is a huge crater maybe whatever made the impact had material that is still cooking beneath the surface? Please excuse me if this is just not a possibility. I know it's extremely cold out there where it orbits and maybe that camera isn't even designed to pick up thermals but I'd just thought I would throw in my 2 cents.

Sorry if this has already been brought up, please don't hate

Also very cool space debris flyby going on in that shot

Is there any data how large this area of light consists?

Can't help, but the bright spots looks like reflecting metal. Metal reflecting the sun of course. An artificial satellite?

originally posted by: charlyv
The new shots, when it gets down to picture perfect levels should be astounding.

or..

originally posted by: Urantia1111
a reply to: Kapusta

Since it appears from this particular image to be emitting its own light from the shadowy crater, Im going with inhabited artificial structure. Doesnt look like reflected light to me.

Really so what does reflected light look like

If I take a picture of the asphalt on a road that's reflected light, if I take a picture of a snowy landscape that's reflected light do both surfaces look the same

So I am look forward to your explanation on how you know this isn't reflected light

originally posted by: AnahataN
Is it possible that the bright spots are a heat signature?

No, the several wavelengths that camera uses do not include the ones that are related to temperature.

As I haven't seen that data from Ceres' photos I went looking for information from Vesta's photos taken by Dawn, and from the three photos I randomly chose I could see the exposure time was between 0.2 and 0.5 seconds, so it's not that difficult to have something more reflective to appear over exposed in a photo like that.

originally posted by: anotherdaytoday
Can't help, but the bright spots looks like reflecting metal. Metal reflecting the sun of course. An artificial satellite?

It may be reflective material, but it may be impossible to tell what that material is at the present time because (as ArMaP has noted) the pix. That in turn may be due to that fact that the exposure levels are turned up relatively high for those images in order for the cameras to capture detail of the rest of Ceres (which is a dark as coal).

So the white pixels may not be real information, but just an artifact from the camera due to sensor overload. Granted, there are bright spots under those white pixels causing that image sensor overload, but those white pixels we see may not be the actual bright spots.

And it doesn't need to be metallic; there are mineral salts that can be very reflective (think of a salt flat). Ice is also very reflective (think of Enceladus, which is one of the most reflective bodies known in the solar system), but then ice may not last for a long time exposed to the vacuum of space without sublimating away.

Once they get into the next orbit (the survey orbit, which starts June 6), maybe they will hopefully be able to take images with a lower exposure. Sure -- the rest of Ceres will be too dark to see anything if they use that lower exposure, but the bright spots may no be overexposed like they are now.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

My first sentence was cut short above (I should have proofread it better). What I should have written was:

"It may be reflective material, but it may be impossible to tell what that material is at the present time because (as ArMaP has noted) the pixels that we see as white pixels may be due to image sensor overload caused by overexposure"

a reply to: Soylent Green Is PeopleWow, a sensor overload on a very dimly lit asteroid. That must be one hell of a reflection...

originally posted by: All Seeing Eye
a reply to: Soylent Green Is PeopleWow, a sensor overload on a very dimly lit asteroid. That must be one hell of a reflection...

Ceres is not dimly lit; it receives a lot of sunlight. It's dark because it's made of dark material.

Saturn's moon Enceladus has one of the brightest reflectivity of any object in the solar system, and it is more than three times as far away from the sun as Ceres is. No matter how dark the rest of Ceres is (it's about the darkness of coal), that have no relevance on how reflective a reflective material (say ice, or salts, or a mineral) on Ceres would be.

If you shine sunlight on a patch of ice on a black surface here on Earth, the patch of ice would be highly reflective while the black surface remained relatively dark.

The reason for the overexposure could be that they wanted to be able to map Ceres on this first orbit, and to do so they needed to see Ceres, which meant exposure times long enough to brighten the coal-like surface in order to see it better.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

Ceres is not dimly lit; it receives a lot of sunlight.

That would depend on your point of view.
Because of its distance from the Sun (about 2.5 AU), it gets about 16% the sunlight that Earth does.

a reply to: Soloprotocol

I'd definitely say we'd be facing an 'OR' situation should anything show up that isn't 100% a natural phenomena.

How could they say and do anything else and maintain the status quo?

They couldn't and they won't.

originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

Ceres is not dimly lit; it receives a lot of sunlight.

That would depend on your point of view.
Because of its distance from the Sun (about 2.5 AU), it gets about 16% the sunlight that Earth does.

True. That's why I compared it to Enceladus, which is very bright. Enceladus, being more than three times further away from the Sun, would receive about nine or ten time less solar energy than Ceres does (considering the inverse square law).

Heck, even the four major moons of Jupiter are brightly-lit enough to be visible from Earth with relatively inexpensive binoculars, and they are about twice as far from the Sun as Ceres is.

The point is that even if the rest of Ceres is made up of non-bright material, how does that fact effect the ability of other more reflective materials on Ceres (such as ice or mineral salts) to cause an image sensor overload?

originally posted by: Okeyd57

originally posted by: NickK3
a reply to: Kapusta

Does anyone know if we will ever get a picture looking back at the spots when they are turned away from the sun - that would solve if it's a reflection or not pretty quickly...

The picture 2 posts above yours doesn't appear to be in direct sunlight to me. It's definitely turned away from the Sun enough to eliminate it as the source. This just seems way too bright to be from sunlight reflections. Also, it doesn't seem to vary in intensity as it turns, which I expect it would if the Sun was the source.

Strange universe we live in.

I've been asking the question...are there any images posted or about to be posted, that show this area while it is in 'night'...nobody has answered, so either nobody knows, or those images don't exist...which is a little strange considering much of the probes view is of Ceres in darkness, as it was approaching with Ceres between it and the sun.

If anybody knows where these images are, i'd be interested to know.

BTW..i'm NOT thinking aliens are the cause of these bright spots, in case anyone was wondering...although i'd be delighted if i were wrong about that.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

True. That's why I compared it to Enceladus, which is very bright. Enceladus, being more than three times further away from the Sun, would receive about nine or ten time less solar energy than Ceres does (considering the inverse square law).

Enceladus has a high albedo but it is not really very bright, as you point out it recieves very little sunlight.

The point is that even if the rest of Ceres is made up of non-bright material, how does that fact effect the ability of other more reflective materials on Ceres (such as ice or mineral salts) to cause an image sensor overload?

I agree with what you said earlier. The bright areas are bright only in comparison to the rest of the surface. But there is a dramatic difference never the less. They do have a much higher albedo. That indicates that there is something very different about them.

The bright areas are bright only in comparison to the rest of the surface. But there is a dramatic difference never the less. They do have a much higher albedo. That indicates that there is something very different about them.

I'd love to know your thoughts on this Phage, what are the leading theories amongst Scientists and which do you feel is the most likely answer or do you have your own theory that currently differs from any of those put forward by "experts"?