Astronomy Picture of the Day
May 21, 2016

Attis Crater almost in the darkness
Attis Crater almost in the darkness

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA and Dr Paolo C. Fienga for the additional process. and color.

This "dark" and, just as usual, very suggestive Contextual Image (or "CTX Frame", for short) of the Dwarf Planet 1-Ceres, taken by the NASA - Dawn Spacecraft on March, 8th, 2016, shows us the complex, uneven and extremely unusually-looking Attis Crater, which measures about 14 miles (such as roughly 22,53 Km) in diameter. The long shadows visible in and around the Crater reflect Attis's truly far-Southern location. Attis Crater is centered at about 73° South Latitude and 257° East Longitude.


The NASA - Dawn Spacecraft captured the scene during its Low-Altitude Mapping Orbit (or "LAMO", for short), from an approx. altitude of 240 miles (such as about 386,2416 Km) above the Surface of 1-Ceres. The Image Resolution is roughly 120 feet (i.e. about 36,576 meters) per pixel (---> Picture Element).


This picture (which is an Original NASA - Dawn Spacecraft's b/w and NON Map-Projected frame published on the NASA - Planetary Photojournal with the ID n. PIA 20672 - DAWN LAMO Image n. 92) has been additionally processed, extra-magnified to aid the visibility of the details, contrast enhanced and sharpened, Gamma corrected and then colorized (according to an educated guess carried out by Dr Paolo C. Fienga-LXTT-IPF) in Absolute Natural Colors (such as the colors that a normal human eye would actually perceive if someone were onboard the NASA - Dawn Spacecraft and then looked ahead, towards the Surface of 1-Ceres), by using an original technique created - and, in time, dramatically improved - by the Lunar Explorer Italia Team.



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