Ceres

The most famous dwarf planet is Pluto but not many people know about Ceres. Ceres is located between Mars and Jupiter in the asteroid belt. There are many interesting facts surrounding this dwarf planet such as: it was the first asteroid to be discovered in 1801 by Giuseppe Piazzi. Piazzi was an Italian astronomer and catholic priest. 

Ceres was named after the Roman goddess of agriculture. It has an orbital period of 4.6 Earth years and a day on Ceres is 9 hours and 4 minutes. It makes up ⅓ of the total size of the asteroid belt just by itself. It has a heavily cratered surface however there are few large craters. This means that Ceres is very old, 4.573 billion years to be exact. 

Finally, one of the most interesting aspects of Ceres is the potential for habitability. It is not actively being described as a potential new home but there is the most amount of water than any other planet in the solar system. There are areas on the surface called brine pockets that could be used to habitat life. 

What do you find most interesting about the dwarf planet Ceres?

Here we see Ceres as compared to the size of the Moon and of Earth.