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posted by Fnord666 on Saturday February 18 2017, @08:24AM   Printer-friendly
from the are-they-labeled-as-organic? dept.

Scientists using imagery from the Dawn spacecraft have found evidence of organic material on the surface of the dwarf planet Ceres:

NASA's Dawn mission has found evidence for organic material on Ceres, a dwarf planet and the largest body in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Scientists using the spacecraft's visible and infrared mapping spectrometer (VIR) detected the material in and around a northern-hemisphere crater called Ernutet. Organic molecules are interesting to scientists because they are necessary, though not sufficient, components of life on Earth.

[...] "This is the first clear detection of organic molecules from orbit on a main belt body," said Maria Cristina De Sanctis, lead author of the study, based at the National Institute of Astrophysics, Rome. The discovery is reported in the journal Science. Data presented in the Science paper support the idea that the organic materials are native to Ceres. The carbonates and clays previously identified on Ceres provide evidence for chemical activity in the presence of water and heat. This raises the possibility that the organics were similarly processed in a warm water-rich environment.

[...] Having completed nearly two years of observations in orbit at Ceres, Dawn is now in a highly elliptical orbit at Ceres, going from an altitude of 4,670 miles (7,520 kilometers) up to almost 5,810 miles (9,350 kilometers). On Feb. 23, it will make its way to a new altitude of around 12,400 miles (20,000 kilometers), about the height of GPS satellites above Earth, and to a different orbital plane. This will put Dawn in a position to study Ceres in a new geometry. In late spring, Dawn will view Ceres with the sun directly behind the spacecraft, such that Ceres will appear brighter than before, and perhaps reveal more clues about its nature.

Localized aliphatic organic material on the surface of Ceres (DOI: 10.1126/science.aaj2305) (DX)


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  • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday February 19 2017, @08:30AM

    by anubi (2828) on Sunday February 19 2017, @08:30AM (#468899) Journal

    I was only trying to inject a little bit of humor by a bad pun. In which case, by "pudding", I meant any organic goo [scientificamerican.com] that might be building up over eons of accretion of denser organic molecules.

    Miller, along with his colleague Harold Urey, used a sparking device to mimic a lightning storm on early Earth. Their experiment produced a brown broth rich in amino acids, the building blocks of proteins.

    I know that isn't the true intent of the phrase, but I thought it close enough.

    --
    "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]