Explanation:
What would it look like to fly over dwarf planet Ceres?
Animators from the
German Aerospace Center recently took actual images and height data from NASA's
robotic Dawn mission -- currently visiting Ceres -- to generate several
fascinating virtual sequences.
The
featured video begins with
a mock orbit around the 950-km wide space rock, with the crater featuring two of
the
enigmatic white spots soon rotating into view.
The next sequences take the viewer around the
Ceres'
north and south poles, and then over a
limb of the dark world highlighting its heavily cratered surface.
Here,
terrain height on the
asteroid belt's largest object has been digitally doubled,
while an artificial star field has been added in the background.
The Dawnspacecraft
will likely remain an unusual
artificial moon of
Ceres long after its mission concludes.
