Is Dwarf-Planet Ceres a Visitor From Icy Edges of Solar System? Probably, Scientists Say

Scientists believe they have discovered the origin of a mysterious dwarf planet that may host life.

Ceres, a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, has many scientists puzzled about how it came to be among the space rocks.

Researchers uploaded the paper, "Dynamical Origin of the Dwarf Planet Ceres," to the arXiv preprint database.

Prague, CZECH REPUBLIC: An artist's rendition shows the solar system with 12 planets, including three new ones to be added if astronomers meeting in the Czech capital approve a new planetary definition, the conference organizer said 16 August 2006. The proposal before the 26th general assembly of the International Astronomical Union distinguishes between eight classical planets and three bodies including Pluto in a new and growing category called "plutons" - Pluto-like objects - plus a former asteroid, Ceres, the IAU said. In July 2005 a US team of astronomers announced that Pluto is much smaller than an enigmatic object, 2003 UB313, which its discoverers claim is the solar system's 10th planet, dubbed Xena, some 15 billion kilometres (nine billion miles) from Earth. The IAU conference will last until August 25. IAU/AFP via Getty Images

Ceres Defined

Ceres, a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt that circles the sun, is a mysterious world with brilliant salt patches, a massive ice volcano, and, most likely, salty water beneath its surface.

EarthSky has discovered that Ceres's icy crust is rich in water ice. It is because there are visible chunks of water ice on the surface. They believe that asteroids or other stony junk hurled these bits out in the end.

NASA's Dawn mission discovered the ice deposits in Occator Crater. It is the same crater where the brightest and greatest salt deposits were found before. In reality, the deposits shined out against the surrounding darker environment, resembling city lights.

Dawn's Gamma Ray and Neutron Detector (GRaND) instrument discovered the fresh ice deposits. Dawn saw the deposits as hydrogen concentrations when it orbited close to the surface.

Ceres has a low density (2.2 grams per cubic centimeter) and a low albedo, which isn't particularly reflective. In this way, Ceres resembles the most common form of the asteroid, the C-type - or carbonaceous chondrite - asteroids. Ceres is near the other C-type asteroids because of its placement inside the main asteroid belt.

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Where Ceres Originated

For each unusual attribute, scientists have given explanations. Ceres may have developed inside the asteroid belt uniquely, allowing it to retain a large amount of water. It might have been created without interfering with the remainder of the main belt.

Possibly over billions of years, many ammonia floated in from the outer solar system and landed on the dwarf planet's surface (and not the other asteroids).

Space.com said Ceres may have been born beyond the orbit of the giant planets and was ejected into the asteroid belt long ago.

Even if Ceres-type planets made it into the asteroid belt, the road ahead was not easy.

Astronomers had previously discovered that perturbations in the outer system impacted asteroids, with the belt losing up to 80% of its objects.

As a result, Ceres was a significant struggle to wind up in the asteroid belt and survive to the current day.

It necessitated a large number of similar things. If at least 3,500 Ceres-size objects existed beyond Saturn's orbit in the early solar system, the researchers calculated that at least one of them would make it into the asteroid belt and stay there.

These figures are based on computer models of planetary orbits during the disruptive phase of the outer-planet migration. Thousands of Ceres-sized objects may sound like a lot, but it's well within the range suggested by previous models for outer-system populations.

The conclusion? Ceres was born on the frigid borders of the solar system and was the luckiest member of a group of objects that changed as the more giant planets altered their positions.