Two mysteriously reflective spots on the dwarf planet Ceres have rotated back into view of a NASA spacecraft studying the planetary body up-close for the first time.
NASA’s Dawn probe caught sight of the strange spots on April 14 and 15 when it was about 14,000 miles (22,000 kilometers) above Ceres’ northern hemisphere, and were released on Monday.
Dawn first detected the bright patches earlier this year.
Scientists still aren’t sure what the bright spots on the dwarf planet could be, but they have a few theories. Many researchers think that patches of ice could be creating the highly reflective spots, while some have also suggested that the spots might be the signatures of ice volcanoes.
NASA officials expect to get a better look at the bright spots once Dawn gets even closer to Ceres. On April 23, the spacecraft will start a three-week stint in an almost-circular orbit about 8,400 miles (13,500 km) above the dwarf planet’s surface before moving into an even closer orbit on May 9.
Dawn arrived at Ceres — which is located in the main belt of asteroids between Jupiter and Mars — on March 6 of this year, sealing its place in history as the first spacecraft to orbit a dwarf planet. Since then, the probe has been moving into an ideal orbit for gathering research data and sending back some amazing imagery of Ceres.
As a dwarf planet, Ceres is in the same category as Pluto, which used to be considered a planet.
Scientists created a color map of Ceres from information gathered by Dawn, but they are hoping to get higher-quality images of the dwarf planet before coming to a conclusion about what the bright spots are.
“The bright spots continue to fascinate the science team, but we will have to wait until we get closer and are able to resolve them before we can determine their source,” Chris Russell, principal investigator for the Dawn mission, said in a statement on April 13.