Ceres – global colour coded topographic map
Ceres – global colour coded topographic map
This colour-coded map from NASA’s Dawn mission shows the highs and lows of topography on the surface of dwarf planet Ceres. The features and regions are labelled with names approved by the International Astronomical Union.
The colour scale extends about 7.5 kilometres below the reference surface in indigo to 7.5 kilometres above the reference surface in white.
The brightest spots on Ceres, located in Occator crater, retain their bright appearance in this map, although they are colour-coded in the same green elevation of the crater floor on which they ate situated. The only named mountain on Ceres is called Ysolo Mons, and lies high in the northern hemisphere at the upper left of the image.
The topographic map was generated by analysing images acquired by Dawn’s German-developed Framing Camera from varying Sun and viewing angles. The map was combined with an image mosaic of Ceres and rendered as a simple cylindrical projection. Not pictured is Kait crater, which lies on longitude 0.