Ceres Low-Altitude Mapping Orbit (LAMO) Options

[Bill Harris]

Hit http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/keywords/dp .

The first LAMOs are here.

--Bill

[craigmcg]

LAMOs are going to be good.

[Gladstoner]

Holy image compression Batman:

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20185

[Bill Harris]

Something went very wrong there-- my first impression was "need to deinterlace" but it's too blocky for that.

I'm having a time figuring out what is where on these wrt the HAMOs. The shots are oblique and I'm not accustomed to the scale. I'll be better once I find the epiphany of a landmark or two.

The Azacca Crater (??) / Samhain Catena area of the LAMO images pia20184 pia20185 and pia20186 may be covered by HAMO images HO-9, 27, 42, 45 and Survey Orbit images SO-11, 48.

--Bill

[JohnVV]

Holy image compression Batman:

no kidding !!! -- a zoom of the tiff


or

[nprev]

Looks like we're there now! Press release. Probably gonna be a bit slow for a couple of days due to US holidays, but please post all relevant discussion here; thanks!

[craigmcg]

... very slow :-)

[ZLD]

Funny that you chose today to post to this thread.

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/new-detail...in-dawn-images/



Four, including the one posted have been added to the photojournal:
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20191
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20192
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20193
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20194

[charborob]

Spectacular! Unfortunately, the TIFF files on the Photojournal are identical to the JPEG files, that is, they are affected by JPEG artifacts. I wonder why they bother to post the TIFF images. There should be much more detail in the uncompressed images, whenever they become available.

[GS_Brazil]

Looking at the white spot, I see it's made of several smaller white spots, just like in the Occator crater.

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpegMod/PIA20193_modest.jpg

[craigmcg]

Funny that you chose today to post to this thread.

Maybe I reminded the powers that be...

[antipode]

Look at the floor of Dantu!

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpegMod/PIA20193_modest.jpg

wowowowow. Impact melt craziness? And the obligatory white patch.

P

Edit: actually reminds me a bit of the 'spider' at the center of Caloris on mercury. Different materials of course but...

[ZLD]

Since they haven't started designating LAMO images with numbers, I'm lettering them until they do.

LAMO F



LAMO G



LAMO H



LAMO I

[ZLD]

LAMO 5

[ZLD]

LAMO 6

[ZLD]

LAMO 7
Blog Post

[JohnVV]

a few low angle views from LAMO-6
PIA20296

[JohnVV]

some more renderings

This time "Kupalo Crater"
http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images...tml?id=PIA20192

[ZLD]

LAMO 8
My blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 9
My blog post

[ZLD]

My blog post

LAMO 10




LAMO 11

[ZLD]

My blog post
LAMO 12

[ZLD]

My blog post
LAMO 13

[Gladstoner]

Fascinating features.

So what's with those radiating 'bird feet'? If I saw those hills on Earth, I'd think they were an erosional remnant of a larger mountain. But on Ceres, there is no apparent process to remove the material in such a manner.

[ZLD]

My best guess is that right after impact, the basin uplifted into something resembling the central ridge you see, and as it rapidly cooled, the exterior sort-of buckled inwards as it compressed from cooling unevenly. This would only be possible if this region is heavier in rocky material.

I will say, I am especially intrigued by the feature at center left, along the central ridge. Tall peak, central pit, who knows...

[Ken2]

Fascinating features.

So what's with those radiating 'bird feet'? If I saw those hills on Earth, I'd think they were an erosional remnant of a larger mountain. But on Ceres, there is no apparent process to remove the material in such a manner.

I favor the least interesting explanation as evident in LAMO G, I think it's due to settling and sliding of the puffy ejecta in-fill of the craters.

Most craters* start out as an empty cones, and in-fill by their ejecta and landslides, and the ejecta of countless other craters. The craters are filled of unstable relatively puffy fine-grained ejecta. Subsequent impacts cause huge Ceres-quakes which will cause landslides (clearly evident all over the place) and settling, which I believe is the majority of the cracks on crater floors.


*Most craters (other then young ones big enough to have lava in-fill at the time of creation, and very large ones (I don't know what that size is on Ceres, and it's probably a function of age))
e.g. old (earliest) craters have a harder surface which may rebound more. Also assuming it was mostly a molten interior at the time of formation, then the lava in-fill (and after a given crater could no longer expose lava) then elastic rebound would be decreasing as a function of age. The later craters would be formed in a puffy impact gardened surface which looks to be km thick. An impact in a loosely bound matrix would evacuate a clean cone and then have severe landslides back into the pit. It's even possible that most of the central peaks are in fact landslide conjunctions (i.e. if there are landslides all around the craters they would meet in the middle and after a few met the forming ridge/peak would accumulate subsequence landslide terminating debris as the crater in-filled. I think these type of processes may explain the majority of Cere's crater's features. I wonder what magnitude Cere's quake is generated for a given impact diameter and distance from the impact?

[JohnVV]

impact , stresses, land movement and so on

i bet that when the papers start coming out it will be many things all having a part

No 3d renderings yet , just a heightmap
-- 8 bit normalized 0,255

[Gladstoner]

Occator and Dantu: Before and after?



Possibly analogous features marked:



Can't wait to see the Occator close-ups....

[Bill Harris]

The Asterisk Central peaks are likely volcanic.

--Bill

[ZLD]

I'd like them to be volcanic as well but there's little to show they are. No visible flows anywhere really. Not that they couldn't have long since been erased, but there's no evidence to push for it. Several mound-like features are present with what would seem to be central depressions.

Also, interesting comparison Gladstoner. I definitely think there is some resemblance here. However, I have to wonder that if they have been through similar processes, in regards to Dantu, why has a small patch of bright material near the cracks remained while everything else has disappeared, especially a bright central patch of it in the center of the central ridge. One possibility is that it has been recently active, long after most of the bight material was covered up or insolation caused the material to become less reflective. But if it was recently active, then how? Strange place.

[Habukaz]

Re: spots: I'm taking pics of small parts of Ceres, covering it over time. Don't have good Occator pics yet; eventually I will. Stay tuned!

https://twitter.com/NASA_Dawn/status/692099462332682241

Haven't seen or heard any word on the mountain, yet.

[Bill Harris]

My idea is that the really good LAMO images are spectacular and good material for papers, so they've not released them in the dozen-or-so daily images. After the papers get out and the data hits the PDS we'll have some jaw-droppers. Time will tell.

--Bill

[ZLD]

My blog post
LAMO 14

[Gladstoner]

I definitely think there is some resemblance here. However, I have to wonder that if they have been through similar processes, in regards to Dantu, why has a small patch of bright material near the cracks remained while everything else has disappeared, especially a bright central patch of it in the center of the central ridge. One possibility is that it has been recently active, long after most of the bight material was covered up or insolation caused the material to become less reflective. But if it was recently active, then how?

Yes, we may be seeing two different stages of the life cycle of some 'volcanic' process. The sparse white spots in Dantu could be the (relatively recent) dying gasps of activity. For an earthly analogy, I'm thinking along the lines of the cinder cones atop the dormant Mauna Kea (Hawaii) vs. the more robust lava flows from the younger Mauna Loa.

[Daniele_bianchin...]

I think it is a central peak, some as seen on the Moon or Mercury. I study enough geology, and volcanoes. I honestly don't see a signs of volcanic activity. However, I don 't know what form would a volcano over a small body without gravity 'as Ceres.
These is the only structures that seem cones, but perhaps just a coincidence ..



This is a volcanic chain of example, not very clear volcano, but an expert recognizes obvious signs of volcano, although it is a not classical volcano

[JohnVV]

low angle renderings of that "volcano?"


bare mesh, mesh and a gray shader, mesh and the image texture

[Gladstoner]

I think it is a central peak, some as seen on the Moon or Mercury. I study enough geology, and volcanoes. I honestly don't see a signs of volcanic activity. However, I don 't know what form would a volcano over a small body without gravity 'as Ceres.
These is the only structures that seem cones, but perhaps just a coincidence ..

Plus, impact craters are more likely to be preserved on the summit of a mountain than on its slopes.

[ZLD]

LAMO 15

My blog post

[Michael Capobian...]

Finally, a look into Kerwan, the sand dollar.

[Gladstoner]

Looks like a mini Haulani:

[ZLD]

I didn't get to watch all of the SBAG Dawn presentation this morning. Hopefully I will get an update today from the NASA public affairs office about the recording and I will post it if available. From what I did see, it was a pretty good update to the status of the mission with lots of good slides and information. The slides should be posted by the end of the day which will include a pretty good shot of Haulani in LAMO. Below is a screen grab.



Also posted today was a nice animation from DLR, of a simulated flyover of Ceres, similar to the previous animation but with much higher resolution. Link

[ZLD]

LAMO 16
My blog post

[Ken2]

Fascinating features.

So what's with those radiating 'bird feet'? If I saw those hills on Earth, I'd think they were an erosional remnant of a larger mountain. But on Ceres, there is no apparent process to remove the material in such a manner.

I favor the least interesting explanation as evident in Kupalo Crater from LAMO PIA20192, I think it's due to settling and sliding of the puffy ejecta in-fill of the craters.

Most craters* start out as an empty cones, and in-fill by their ejecta and landslides, and the ejecta of countless other craters. The craters are filled of unstable relatively puffy fine-grained ejecta. Subsequent impacts cause huge Ceres-quakes which will cause landslides (clearly evident all over the place) and settling, which I believe is the majority of the cracks on crater floors.


*Most craters (other then young ones big enough to have lava in-fill at the time of creation, and very large ones (I don't know what that size is on Ceres, and it's probably a function of age))
e.g. old (earliest) craters have a harder surface which may rebound more. Also assuming it was mostly a molten interior at the time of formation, then the lava in-fill (and after a given crater could no longer expose lava) then elastic rebound would be decreasing as a function of age. The later craters would be formed in a puffy impact gardened surface which looks to be km thick. An impact in a loosely bound matrix would evacuate a clean cone and then have severe landslides back into the pit. It's even possible that most of the central peaks are in fact landslide conjunctions (i.e. if there are landslides all around the craters they would meet in the middle and after a few met the forming ridge/peak would accumulate subsequence landslide terminating debris as the crater in-filled. I think these type of processes may explain the majority of Cere's crater's features. I wonder what magnitude Cere's quake is generated for a given impact diameter and distance from the impact?

Just a visual update on my hypothesis:

Kupalo Crater from LAMO PIA20192

The younger Kupalo Crater clearly shows landslide formed cracks and this view [below] from today's movie shows how the Dantu settling/landslide fault line cracks are most likely the same mechanism. ZLD's screen grab today (previous post) of Haulani in LAMO shows similar landslide cracks. Also the Kupalo and Dantu landslides both appear to end at the central "peak" area with a linear terminus pile-up. Note that landslides in .028g should travel much further then in 1g on earth.

[ZLD]

LAMO 17
My blog post

[JohnVV]

A few low angle renders from LAMO 16
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20306

[ZLD]

LAMO 18

My blog post

[JohnVV]

lamo 18 - PIA20308

low angle illumination like this ( approx. 10Deg. ) is pushing things a bit
this required a lot of manual editing to correct the dem used

i had it inpaint the shadows and dodge and burn the heightmap
the first of the two is just a rendered mesh
the second has the texture draped over it

[ZLD]

LAMO 19

My blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 20

My blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 21

My blog post

[Habukaz]

Aaand....we got Occator*

* its western rim

[ZLD]

LAMO 22

My blog post

[JohnVV]

LAMO-22 -- PIA20312

a few renders -- less impressive than i thought it would turn out

[PDP8E]

John, its very impressive!

[ZLD]

LAMO 23

Blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 24

Blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 25

Blog post

[JohnVV]

LAMO 26 - PIA20380
http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images...tml?id=PIA20380

this one has A LOT of small craters

[ZLD]

LAMO 26

My blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 27

My blog post

[JohnVV]

and the renders in Blender that go along with LAMO 27




and a Google photo album of My LAMO renders
https://goo.gl/photos/iAtFUPmE4QVxpcY29

[ZLD]

I feel like I hadn't seen some of those John. Those are all great!

[ZLD]

LAMO 28

My blog post

[JohnVV]

I feel like I hadn't seen some of those John. Those are all great!

some might not have been posted here.
some were in the old hamo folder

and there a few that once i get a mesh and look at them in 3d , there is not much to look at

you end up with the problem of the vacation slide show pictures

[Ken2]

Here's a quick gif of HAMO vs LAMO. I didn't correct for altitude and look angle distortions so it's pretty rough - but it is a nice way to show the context and improvement on this pict (LAMO 28 - PIA20382 / PIA20000)

<Click to animate>

[Bill Harris]

Comparison of the recent LAMO LO-28 image with an earlier HAMO image of episodic mass-wasting features.

https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres...es4x%2BLO28.png

Reference:
https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres...ient--annot.png
https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres...-enh--annot.png

--Bill

[ZLD]

LAMO 29

My blog post

[ZLD]

LAMO 30

My blog post

[JohnVV]

Lamo 30 - PIA20384

[Bill Harris]

Created a new Ceres Gallery today and moved images into it:

https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres-LAMO-Images/

--Bill

[ZLD]

LAMO 31

My blog post

[Habukaz]

The latest image is quite the oblique beauty. I hope we get lots more of these.

[ZLD]

LAMO 32

My blog post





Also, reoriented view of imaged region.

[ZLD]

Juling Crater synthetic animation. This transitions from HAMO 39 to LAMO 32 from yesterday.

[ZLD]

LAMO 33

My blog post





Also, another orientation corrected view.

[ZLD]

LAMO 34

My blog post






L29-L34

[Gladstoner]

Dantu Crater mosaic:

(PIA20193, PIA20300, PIA20303)

[alan]

The bright streaks on the crater walls, landslides of bright material or salt deposits left behind by flows of liquid?

[ZLD]

LAMO 35

My blog post

[JohnVV]

a few renders of LAMO-35 PIA20389




in particular is the "wasting" area at the top of the image

[Gladstoner]

The bright streaks on the crater walls, landslides of bright material or salt deposits left behind by flows of liquid?

My guess is that they are scattered/isolated deposits (veins?) of salt that were exposed by mass wasting of the crater wall.

[dvandorn]

Considering the extensive emplacement of impact debris mantling units all over Ceres, I would guess the top 500 to 1,000 meters of the surface is a battered, crushed layer of poorly mixed, brecciated debris. There are quite likely a huge number of salt and salty ice deposits embedded within this debris layer.

When craters are made in this kind of surface, these pockets of high-albedo salt (or salty ice) become exposed; more are exposed as mass wasting deflates large crater walls. Thus, the occasional white spots and streaks seen in crater walls.

Now, this is completely separate from directly-emplaced cryovolcanic deposits, like what we appear to see in Occator. Those (and there are quite a fewer number of them than the smaller white spots) seem to be examples of deeper material moving volcanically up to the surface from deeper layers of soft salty ice (or even liquid salty water). That's a different emplacement mechanism from most of the small bright spots we see on crater walls, I think.

Think of it this way -- take a surface composed mostly of black sand, and randomly embed a bunch of white pebbles in it. Then hit it with an impact. Your resulting crater will show mostly black sand walls, but every once in a while a white pebble will poke out through the major black sand matrix of the unit. And as crater walls recede due to mass wasting, new white pebbles are exposed. Now, just replace the black sand with the general dark material of Ceres' surface and the white pebbles with concentrations of salt and/or salty ice, and you have a model for what may well be happening on Ceres.

[ngunn]

When craters are made in this kind of surface, these pockets of high-albedo salt (or salty ice) become exposed; more are exposed as mass wasting deflates large crater walls. Thus, the occasional white spots and streaks seen in crater walls.

Now, this is completely separate from directly-emplaced cryovolcanic deposits, like what we appear to see in Occator.

I think the first paragraph quoted describes very well the likely formation process for white spots. So why invoke a different process for Occator? Any 'activity' there could just be the mass wasting of freshly exposed ices you already mentioned.

[ZLD]

I can't recall what conference was going on last week but I definitely saw some graphics pop up on Twitter that showed that the Dawn team is pursuing cryovolcanic processes for Occator. There was a nice side cut-away image as well. I'll try to find it and post if do. The possibility has been floated in several other recent talks as well.

[tanjent]

If there are deposits of white salty material embedded at random locations in the regolith, then they should be uncovered more frequently around the rims of the craters than in the centers, should they not? Cryovolcanic scenarios do seem to fit a bit better better with the "bullseye" pattern we see in places like Occator.

[ZLD]

LAMO 36

My blog post

[Bill Harris]

Recent LAMO imagery and a current LAMO Index map:

https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres-LAMO-Images/

--Bill

[ZLD]

LAMO 37

My blog post

[JohnVV]

LAMO -36 (PIA20390)

is a very low angle of illumination , the process i use dose not do a great job on these images
but a few areas look good

[ZLD]

LAMO 38

My Blog Post





-----

LAMO 39

My Blog Post

[charborob]

LAMO 39-40 mosaic:

[ZLD]

LAMO 40

My Blog Post

[Gladstoner]

LAMO 39-40 mosaic:

That ejecta seems to be more fluid than usual (as far as we've seen so far). In places, it resembles outflow channels on Mars.

Some context of Ikapati Crater....

HAMO image 64:
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA20127

Survey Orbit image 30:
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA19599

This ejecta seems to be mostly confined within the low point of a larger, older crater (outlined in yellow):

[ZLD]

Was certainly thinking that as well Gladstoner. There is several very peculiar spots that look like very quick or non-viscous material moved quickly to fill the lower crater and surrounding area.

[Gladstoner]

A checklist of interesting features in Ikapati Crater (labeled in image):



1. White spots. Their extent is minor compared to other craters.
2. Extensional fractures. These are on the floor, rim and ejecta.
3. 'Shotgun blast' pits. These seem to be more than mere clustered impacts.
4. Degraded central peak. The flat top (or pit?) contrasting with the fluted sides is quite interesting.
5. Fluvial-like flow structures.

[Bill Harris]

Ahuna. The closer we look, the more mysterious it becomes. I'm still thinking "my gawd, it's full of stars... "

--Bill

[Explorer1]

How large is the gap between the rim of the crater and Ahuna's slopes? The caption says 35 m/ pixel (here), so less than a kilometer separation, by my count. Is it just a coincidence that the mountain is so close?
What an odd view one would have standing on the surface there, too...

[Gladstoner]

That terrain on top of Ahuna.... It just seems to have no rhyme or reason. If anything, it appears like a souffle that has risen and collapsed back down a bit (with some subsequent mass wasting around the edges).

Oh, and that hanging valley on the west side of the summit is spectacular.

[ZLD]

LAMO 41

My Blog Post





-----

Ahuna Mons in LAMO

Cropped and enhanced:

[Bill Harris]

That terrain on top of Ahuna.... It just seems to have no rhyme or reason.

I can't quite place with anything known. And the walls, NW to SE, still look rather vitreous and translucent. And the talus (or lack of) at the toe of the slope. I predict views with different lighting angles and a series of oblique views.

Here is a montage of Ahuna from SO6 through HO1:

https://univ.smugmug.com/Dawn-Mission/Ceres...mtn_montage.png

--Bill