Mysterious Light on Ceres

PaulaJedi

PaulaJedi

Survivor
Zenith
Messages
8,859
Khaos said:
Num7 said:
The surface of this object must be pretty cold, right? Does it make sense that a volcano shows up like that?

How do we know if the bright spot is on top of a mountain, or at the bottom of a crater?

I'm really curious to know what it is.
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There could be cryo-volcanic activity on the surface. But I doubt its water, the way the lights are, it doesn't reflect like water would. Its a light source. Why is there a light source on a dwarf planet, in the asteroid belt, in a cold region of space?

Why would we even go to Ceres for in the first place? There are plenty of other dwarf planets to visit, and we pick Ceres? Something tells me that they knew about this before they released it.

Its like that Rosetta comet probe. Find it curious how ESA detected a radio signal coming from the comet 20 years ago, and then NASA launches a spacecraft that takes 10 years to get to said comet. Yeah...
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Someone is checking us out from a distance. That's what I think. If someone can send radio signals in our direction and place something on a dwarf planet THIS CLOSE to us, they know we're here.

Incidentally, it seems odd that there would only be two spots of ice. You would think the ice would be all over the place.
 
Martian

Martian

Senior Member
Messages
1,137
Um, guys... As a martian, I'd like to lend my perspective.

I saw photos from multiple angles showing light from the crater. Ice typically has specular reflection, which means you have to look at it from a certain angle with respect to the light source to see it. However, a light source or retroreflector can be seen from any angle.

Also, what part of the spectrum was used for the photos? Visible light, infrared, or something else?
 
CDS

CDS

Member
Messages
432
To me it looks like water that erupted like a bubbler and froze really quickly. The center of craters often have pinnacles, it could be a water geyser pinnacle.
 

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