November 22, 2014

Geological map of the giant asteroid Vesta. Brown colors represent the oldest, most heavily cratered surface. Purple colors in the north and light blue represent terrains modified by the Veneneia and Rheasilvia impacts, respectively. Light purples and dark blue colors below the equator represent the interior of the Rheasilvia and Veneneia basins. Greens and yellows represent relatively young landslides or other downhill movement and crater impact materials, respectively (Image NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU)

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A little over a year ago, an atlas of the giant asteroid Vesta was presented but the analysis of the data collected by the Dawn space probe went even further. A special issue of the journal “Icarus” was all about Vesta presenting a series of geological maps that show details never seen before the characteristics of its surface.

David Williams of the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University led a team of 14 researchers in a task that lasted about two and a half years. The team used the photographs taken by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft when it spent more than one year orbiting Vesta to create a geological map.