Geology of Ceres

The geology of Ceres consists of the characteristics of the surface, the crust and the interior of the dwarf planet Ceres. The surface of Ceres is comparable to the surfaces of Saturn's moons Rhea and Tethys, and Uranus's moons Umbriel and Oberon.

The spectrum of Ceres is similar to that of C-type asteroids. However, since it also has spectral features of carbonates and clay minerals, which are usually absent in the spectra of other C-type asteroids, Ceres is sometimes classified as a G-type asteroid.

Ceres's surface has an albedo of 0.09, which is quite dark compared to the moons in the outer Solar System. This might be a result of the relatively high temperature of Ceres's surface, the maximum temperature with the Sun overhead was estimated from measurements to be 235 K (−38 °C; −37 °F) on 5 May 1991. In a vacuum, ice is unstable at this temperature. Material left behind by the sublimation of surface ice could explain the dark surface of Ceres compared to the icy moons of the outer Solar System.

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