Pyramid and Bright Spots. Ceres' Continues To Amaze NASA

Images of Ceres taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft show a pyramid like structure on the dwarf planet. There however is no confirmation to what is causing the 'bright spots'.

At least eight spots in a stretch of six miles, next to the brightest area are seen in the latest images. Spots are located in a crater 55 miles wide. While scientists think it could be ice and salt reflecting light, until the infrared spectrometer device on Dawn is able to analyze the light to reveal the nature of the material, a confirmation will remain elusive. The device can tell the nature of material by analyzing the spectrum of reflected light.

The new images taken on June 9 also show features not seen on other celestial bodies.

"The surface of Ceres has revealed many interesting and unique features. For example, icy moons in the outer solar system have craters with central pits, but on Ceres central pits in large craters are much more common. These and other features will allow us to understand the inner structure of Ceres that we cannot sense directly," said Carol Raymond, deputy principal investigator for the Dawn mission.

The pyramid like structure is a mountain that rises about 3 miles above surface. It is said to rise from a visibly smooth surface area. The landscape of Ceres also indicates past activity of flows, landslides and collapses. The evidence for activity seen on the dwarf planet is greater that what astronomers saw when Dawn orbited the proto-planet Vesta between 2011 and 2012.

Dawn is in its mapping orbit around Ceres at an altitude of 2,700 miles. It will enter a smaller orbit at an altitude of 900 miles in early August.