mmcirvin: (Default)
mmcirvin ([personal profile] mmcirvin) wrote2011-07-18 06:29 pm

Vesta closer up

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-213

This is the inside of the big south-polar crater. Now I can't tell whether the grooves that seemed to be visible in lower-resolution photos were just a trick of the light.

[identity profile] mmcirvin.livejournal.com 2011-07-20 02:55 am (UTC)(link)
...To give a better idea, here's an elevation map from the Hubble telescope:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vesta-Elevation.jpg

The recent closeup pictures are looking right at the lump in the middle of that crater covering the whole southern hemisphere. Since it's a crater on a convex object, it doesn't actually look all that concave.