Take photos of mountains on the dwarf planet closest to Earth

NASA's Dawn spacecraft just sent back to Earth the latest images of dwarf planet Ceres. These are photos taken at the lowest altitude ever recorded.

Dawn is a robot spacecraft launched by NASA to explore the two largest dwarf planets in the asteroid belt, Vesta and Ceres.

Volcanic pits on the surface of Ceres - (Photo: NASA).

The ship was launched on September 27, 2007, to planet Vesta on July 16, 2011 and explored Vesta from 2012. Next, the ship arrived at Ceres to perform its duties from 2015.

These are the latest photos that Dawn has taken over the years, at an altitude of about 440km and show a more complete view of the mysterious dwarf planets.

The photo shows a small crater with a diameter of about 36km, surrounded by small mountain ranges. There is also a medium sized glass crater here about 120km.

"This rugged terrain shows the nature of this planet as an ancient form," NASA said.

The image shows Dawn above 1,470km altitude.The color image shows Ceres' gravitational field, which gives scientists its internal structure.Red indicates places where gravity is strong, blue and yellow indicate weak gravity - (Photo: NASA).

Occator volcanic pit on Ceres surface - (Photo: NASA).

Jugling volcanic pit in southern Ceres - (Photo: NASA).

In this June, Dawn achieved a new trajectory and continued to send materials to the scientists. It is expected to fly at an altitude of only 50km in Ceres 'sky, collecting gamma rays and a neutron spectrum to help scientists better understand the chemical compounds of Ceres' high frequency.

"We are looking forward to Dawn's further steps , " said Carol Raymond, Dawn's supervisor from NASA.

Ceres is interested in science because it is the dwarf planet closest to Earth and may have the necessary elements, especially water, for life.