Dawn LAMO Image 197

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Caption:

This image, taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, shows a series of linear features, which are depressions that located within the large Yalode Crater on Ceres. The widest of the linear features is approximately 0.9 miles (1.5 kilometers) in width.

Scientists think these features formed when extensional stresses pulled the surface of Ceres apart. In the upper part of the image, the linear features cut through several impact craters, indicating that the fractures are younger than those particular craters.

The linear features are not the youngest things visible in this view, however. There are also small impact craters imprinted upon them, meaning those craters must have appeared more recently.

Yalode is 160 miles (260 kilometers) in diameter.

Dawn took this image on June 15, 2016, from its low-altitude mapping orbit, at a distance of about 240 miles (385 kilometers) above the surface. The image resolution is 120 feet (35 meters) per pixel.

Background Info:

Dawn's mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Dawn is a project of the directorate's Discovery Program, managed by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. UCLA is responsible for overall Dawn mission science. Orbital ATK, Inc., in Dulles, Virginia, designed and built the spacecraft. The German Aerospace Center, the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, the Italian Space Agency and the Italian National Astrophysical Institute are international partners on the mission team. For a complete list of mission participants, see http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission .

For more information about the Dawn mission, visit http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov .

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