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Register a new userA Giant Crater on 90 Antiope?
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Mutual event observations between the two components of 90 Antiope were carried out in 2007-2008. The pole position was refined to lambda0 = 199.5+/-0.5 eg and beta0 = 39.8+/-5 deg in J2000 ecliptic coordinates, leaving intact the physical solution for the components, assimilated to two perfect Roche ellipsoids, and derived after the 2005 mutual event season (Descamps et al., 2007). Furthermore, a large-scale geological depression, located on one of the components, was introduced to better match the observed lightcurves. This vast geological feature of about 68 km in diameter, which could be postulated as a bowl-shaped impact crater, is indeed responsible of the photometric asymmetries seen on the shoulders of the lightcurves. The bulk density was then recomputed to 1.28+/-0.04 gcm-3 to take into account this large-scale non-convexity. This giant crater could be the aftermath of a tremendous collision of a 100-km sized proto-Antiope with another Themis family member. This statement is supported by the fact that Antiope is sufficiently porous (~50%) to survive such an impact without being wholly destroyed. This violent shock would have then imparted enough angular momentum for fissioning of proto-Antiope into two equisized bodies. We calculated that the impactor must have a diameter greater than ~17 km, for an impact velocity ranging between 1 and 4 km/s. With such a projectile, this event has a substantial 50% probability to have occurred over the age of the Themis family.
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A diurnal varying haze layer at the bright spots of Occator on dwarf planet Ceres has been reported from images of the Dawn Framing Camera. This finding is supported by ground-based observations revealing diurnal albedo changes at Occators longitude. In the present work, we further investigate the previously reported haze phenomenon in more detail using additional Framing Camera images. We demonstrate that the light scattering behavior at the central floor of Occator is different compared to a typical cerean surface and is likely inconsistent with a pure solid surface scatterer. The identified deviation is best explained by an additional component to the scattered light of the surface, i.e., a haze layer. Our results support the water vapor detection by Herschel observations though the existence of a tenuous cerean exosphere is not yet confirmed.
The identification of impact craters on planetary surfaces provides important information about their geological history. Most studies have relied on individual analysts who map and identify craters and interpret crater statistics. However, little work has been done to determine how the counts vary as a function of technique, terrain, or between researchers. Furthermore, several novel internet-based projects ask volunteers with little to no training to identify craters, and it was unclear how their results compare against the typical professional researcher. To better understand the variation among experts and to compare with volunteers, eight professional researchers have identified impact features in two separate regions of the moon. Small craters (diameters ranging from 10 m to 500 m) were measured on a lunar mare region and larger craters (100s m to a few km in diameter) were measured on both lunar highlands and maria. Volunteer data were collected for the small craters on the mare. Our comparison shows that the level of agreement among experts depends on crater diameter, number of craters per diameter bin, and terrain type, with differences of up to $simpm45%$. We also found artifacts near the minimum crater diameter that was studied. These results indicate that caution must be used in most cases when interpreting small variations in crater size-frequency distributions and for craters $le10$ pixels across. Because of the natural variability found, projects that emphasize many people identifying craters on the same area and using a consensus result are likely to yield the most consistent and robust information.
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We obtained spectra for two giants of Crater (Crater J113613-105227 and Crater J113615-105244) using X-Shooter at the VLT. The spectra have been analysed with the MyGIsFoS code using a grid of synthetic spectra computed from one dimensional, Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (LTE) model atmospheres. Effective temperature and surface gravity have been derived from photometry measured from images obtained by the Dark Energy Survey. The radial velocities are 144.3+-4.0 km/s for Crater J113613-105227 and and 134.1+-4.0 km/s for Crater J113615-105244. The metallicities are [Fe/H]=-1.73 and [Fe/H]=-1.67, respectively. Beside the iron abundance we could determine abundances for nine elements: Na, Mg, Ca, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Ni and Ba. For Na and Ba we took into account deviations from LTE, since the corrections are significant. The abundance ratios are similar in the two stars and resemble those of Galactic stars of the same metallicity. On the deep photometric images we could detect several stars that lie to the blue of the turn-off. conclusions heading (optional), leave it empty if necessary The radial velocities imply that both stars are members of the Crater stellar system. The difference in velocity between the two taken at face value, implies a velocity dispersion > 3.7 km/s at 95% confidence level. Our spectroscopic metallicities are in excellent agreement with that determined by previous investigations using photometry. Our deep photometry and the spectroscopic metallicity imply an age of 7 Gyr for the main population of the system. The stars to the blue of the turn-off can be interpreted as a younger population, of the same metallicity and an age of 2.2 Gyr. Finally, spatial and kinematical parameters support the idea that this system is associated to the galaxies Leo~IV and Leo~V. All the observations favour the interpretation of Crater as a dwarf galaxy. (Abridged).
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