An asteroid outside the window: the flyby of Vesta can be seen with the naked eye. Vesta: facts about the brightest asteroid Which asteroid can be observed with the naked eye

Vesta in the horoscope is associated with the sign of Virgo, but she also has an affinity with the sign of Scorpio. In the original Zodiac of Assyrian culture there was no constellation of Libra: Virgo was followed by Scorpio, and what later became Libra was the claw of Scorpio.

Vesta in the horoscope

The symbols of Virgo and Scorpio are similar, only the sign of Virgo is directed inward, and Scorpio is directed outward. The Great Mother Goddess symbolized both the chastity of the Virgo and the matrimony of Scorpio at the same time. And only in patriarchal culture, the marriage sign of Libra created an artificial division of female roles (virginity before marriage and sexuality after). The discovery of Vesta shows the possibility of combining these two themes in one archetype.

Overall, Vesta reflects the principle of sex as a means of spiritual service. However, in the modern soul it often presents a wide range of sexual difficulties that are the result of the suppression of natural instincts.

Vesta in the signs describes 12 styles of focusing, making commitments, and what we must give up in order to fulfill our life purpose. She also describes the way of handling sexual energy: its freedom, sublimation or suppression.

Vesta in houses indicates an area of ​​obligation or dedication to something, as well as an area of ​​​​limitation (this once again emphasizes Vesta’s connection with the sign of Capricorn and allows us to consider her as its ruler. - Approx.).

Vesta in horoscope signs

Vesta in Aries

People work with strong involvement in the business. Motivation comes from within, and they work better on their own and with their own ideas. Excesses occur when a person is so involved in the whirlpool of his own activity that he leaves no room for others to participate in it. Finding this place can lead to wonderful personal accomplishments.

Vesta in Taurus

Better focusing of energy in a stable state. They are persistent and constant as rocks if they see tangible results from their efforts. Difficulties arise because of their inflexibility. Sexuality is based on the natural release of natural instincts. If there is no sexual satisfaction, sexuality can cause stress. A pragmatic, albeit acceptable approach to sexuality and comfort requires material justification.

Vesta in Gemini

Concentration is facilitated by the spoken word and the information received. Good coordination. Alienation occurs through over-intellectualization and loss of meaning of words. Mental exchange means a lot in sexual relationships. However, these people also tend to use words to create distance between themselves and others. The mind should not be allowed to dominate the emotions.

Vesta in the sign of Cancer

To be active, a person must feel needed by others. Sympathetic connection with families and those who depend on them allows them to open the tap of the reservoir of working energy. Due to emotional hypersensitivity, withdrawal into oneself is possible, which is caused by the desire to protect oneself from real or imagined dangers from others.

Sexual satisfaction occurs when a person feels loved and caressed. And the feeling of insecurity prompts a break in the relationship. Relationships require emotional stability.

Vesta in the sign Leo

A person works best when given creative freedom. The desire to be proud of your work is aimed at the desire to beautifully present the result. Since this personality emanates radiance, alienation may arise if its radiance is<сжигать>those around her, as well as from her arrogance and arrogance. Romanticism and admiration evoke a sexual response. However, sexuality is inhibited if the energy of reproduction is directed only towards one's creative efforts.

Vesta in Virgo

Strong concentration at work. The incentive is the desire for improvement. The tendency to be overloaded and the habit of criticism withdraws from others. Sex is seen as a service to create the comfort of another or as an obligation. The natural response may be hampered by the shortcomings of others. With the harmonization of this moment, much greater efficiency in activity is achieved (Martin Luther).

Vesta in the sign of Libra

The person prefers to work with others more than by himself. He tries to involve others in the work and benefit from their contributions. But because Libras need to compare themselves to others, a strong sense of competitiveness arises. The need to be recognized as equal and reproaches about<взятого и отданного>- an important factor in sexual relationships.

However, because there is a need to be accepted and admired, a person is forced to put aside his own needs and desires. It is vitally important to achieve the necessary balance between personal inclinations and the preferences of others.

Vesta in the sign of Scorpio

Such people often seek depth and are cautious in all undertakings. Sex is seen as a supreme experience, despite all social taboos. On the other hand, the individual may have feelings of guilt, sin and shame that lead him to repress sexuality. Strongest concentration and devotion available.

Vesta in the sign of Sagittarius

A person concentrates well when he works for something in which he believes. The ideal awakens his energy to work. Alienation occurs if he promotes his views without regard for the beliefs of others. Seeking truth or adventure stimulates sexual activity; a lack of honesty can undermine relationships. These people can also put sexual impulses into action. The mixture of these aspects creates practical idealists and mystics who are traumatized by the material world.

Vesta in Capricorn

It is best to work in a disciplined and consistent manner. Effort at work is often motivated by ambition or the desire to succeed. The ability to formulate and execute plans leads to success in administrative work. Adherence to rules and regulations can lead to excessive rigidity. Responsibility is necessary for a fulfilling sexual relationship.

There may be a fear of sexual intimacy or emotionality if associated with being critical or losing power and control. Great strides can be made. Success awaits these people through paying off their debts.

Vesta in Aquarius

A person works best for a humanistic, social, or political motivation: the ideal of freedom for oneself and others. Alienation can occur due to insufficient attention to the needs of loved ones. There is often rebellion towards figures of authority. Sexual response is stimulated by the unusual, and the person engages in sexual relationships with friends on a non-commercial and non-responsible basis.

Vesta in the sign of Pisces

The soul receives energy to work in the service of others. It is difficult to find a point of application of one's strength due to the vagueness of goals. Such a person can play the role of a martyr and make others feel guilty for his suffering. The ability to heal others through sexual interaction or the sublimation of sexuality into spiritual realization.

A person may feel that their sexuality belongs to everyone who needs it, and that no one alone has the right to it. Mixing dreams and reality, in poetry and in practice.

Vesta in the houses of the horoscope

Vesta in the first house of the horoscope

Due to a strong focus on self-determination or pursuing one's own goals, there may be a tendency to exclude long-term relationships from one's life. One-pointedness and abstinence can lead to significant achievements. Being true to yourself.

Vesta in the second house of the horoscope

The ability to generate resources to provide and support oneself and loved ones. There may be restrictions on money, comfort and feelings so that the tension created leads to the study of the art of self-expression (Catherine II - conjunction with Mars).

Vesta in the third house of the horoscope

The purpose of the advanced mind is to disseminate information to others. There may be limitations in communicating in order to clarify one's own ideas. If a person is critical of himself, he may experience a feeling of inferiority of his intelligence. This position is characterized by working with the intellect (Herman Hesse, conjunction with the Moon in Pisces).

Vesta in the IV house of the horoscope

Devotion to home and family. Often, additional responsibilities at home in youth develop into responsibilities towards the family later. Such a person may experience restrictions in personal freedom due to these obligations. An efficient and skilled approach to household chores is required.

Vesta in the 5th house of the horoscope

A calling for personal creative expression - in children or artistic forms. There may be alienation from children, romances and pleasures. Due to excessive sublimation of sexual energy, obstacles may arise in this area. There is a need for a creative profession or something that puts a person in the center of attention.

Vesta in the VI house of the horoscope

Dedication to work and efficient functioning. Health difficulties can draw attention to self-medication, nutrition and physical exercise. The incentive to improve can lead to very good performance.

Vesta in the 7th house of the horoscope

The calling to work in collaboration. But since Vesta craves self-fulfillment and independence, conflict can arise in cases where compromise is required. Often the person is overly absorbed in the interaction.

Vesta in the VIII house of the horoscope

A calling to psychic and occult activities or deep interaction with others. These people may also have difficulty finding someone who matches their sexual intensity, and thus may feel limited in this area. Difficulties with others over the distribution of resources - money and energy - can lead to learning the ability to renounce personal desires and share property.

Vesta in the 9th house of the horoscope

A call to seek the truth. Excessive focus on a belief system can lead to political or religious fanaticism. Limiting the breadth of your horizons. The ideal image must be found in the material world.

Vesta in the X house of the horoscope

Concentration on career or position in society. Closeness to the MC may indicate a spiritual calling. There may be difficulties in finding a satisfying purpose and path if critical abilities are developed. Potential talents include tremendous discipline, thoroughness, and the will to work hard.

Vesta in the XI house of the horoscope

A call to group interaction. There may be restrictions in friends or company, and this makes a person understand the value of others in his life. There is a need to fuse hopes and desires together so that a person can devote himself to an ideal.

Vesta in the XII house of the horoscope

Devoting oneself to selfless service and following spiritual values. There is a strong subconscious need to isolate and withdraw in order to develop deep faith. Persecution for religious beliefs or fear of past mistakes can cause fear of entering into the spiritual nature. There may be subconscious sexual fears and barriers that are overcome by combining the desire for the infinite with a practical appreciation of the physical world and its limitations.

Aspects of Vesta in the horoscope

Aspects of the Sun - Vesta horoscope

Self-fulfillment, work and a sense of duty form the basis of life goals. Harmonious aspects: high level of personal integration. Devotion to the ideal and seriousness of intentions. These people may live according to their defined sexual values ​​and avoid possessive relationships (Carl Jung, conjunct in Leo - psychology of self-integration; Charles Dickens, in Aquarius, on IC).

Stressed: Inability to find a satisfying career. Fear of intimacy and commitment. Mental anxiety and stress due to a feeling of futility in the chosen direction in life. Being overly self-absorbed can lead to alienation from others. The solution to the problem is to develop a target focus and integrate the energy of the individual with her vision of the world.

Aspects of Moon - Vesta horoscope

Concentration is combined with emotional responsibility. Harmonious aspects: fruitfulness, strong desire to care for others. Understanding without words and emotional response. Free and open attitude towards sex. (Baudelaire is in Cancer, square to the Sun in Aries).

Intense: Fear of intimacy and detachment from the emotional needs of others. An overly emotional look inside oneself. There may be infertility. The solution to the problem lies in understanding the essence of moral restrictions and sexual standards. Therapy can be used to help an individual release sexual and emotional energy.

Aspects of Mercury - Vesta horoscope

The need to concentrate on thoughts and in the process of communication. Restlessness in purposeful practical creativity. Harmonious aspects: highly developed intellect, able to focus and direct his thoughts. Incentive to express ideas or devote oneself to teaching. Such a person may succeed in scientific research or as an agent, mediator, medium.

Tense: difficulties in communication - excessive precision in words, or, conversely, irresponsibility and vagueness. A crystalline mental look inside oneself, quirks of the intellect, or simply a focused study of a situation. Sometimes there may be sexual problems due to lack of communication with the partner. The solution to the problem is to clarify personal goals and thoughts and free yourself from unnecessary intellectual baggage. Clear mental processes lead to clear communication.

Aspects of Venus - Vesta horoscope

Individual and independent attitude towards intimate relationships. Harmonious aspects: the ability to combine femininity with individual expression. Sensitive understanding of female psychology. Sublimation of sexual energy for the sake of art or spiritual path.

Tense: Indicates a conflict between the independence or demands of work and the needs of relationships, resulting in withdrawal from people. They can mean puritanism, psychological coldness or frigidity, or, conversely, a tendency towards debauchery. The integration process makes it easier to develop your own sexual rules.

Aspects of Mars - Vesta horoscope

The ability of volitional concentration of energy. Harmonious aspects: the ability to combine autonomy with intimate relationships, sensitivity and mastery of sexual expression. The ability to sublimate sexual energy into the fight for a cause is a spiritual fighter. (Harriet Beecher Stowe, conjunct Scorpio - fight against slavery)

Tense: restrictions in the expression of masculine energy, which can lead to psychological coldness or impotence. Indecision in a responsible situation. Aggression as compensation. The solution to the problem is to study the management of energy, incentives and will, a clear vision of the goal.

Aspects of Juno - Vesta horoscope

An evolutionary path that begins with human autonomy and ends with his reunification with others. Harmonious aspects: the ability to make serious commitments to others. These people devote themselves to purifying and perfecting the partnership, which often takes the form of a sexually charged spiritual union.

Intense: alienation from relationships or isolation within them. Sometimes sacrificing oneself to a partner or being overly involved in the relationship. Sexual dominance and control as part of interaction. Integration is an individual role within responsible relationships.

Aspects of Jupiter - Vesta horoscope

Social assessment of one's vocation. Harmonious aspects: purpose to follow truth and knowledge. These individuals have the ability to synthesize large-scale pictures in detail. Sexual power can be sublimated in the sphere of politics, teaching or spiritual initiation.

Tense: Conflict between one's own philosophy and what serves the greater good. These people may believe that only their philosophy is valuable as truth, that is, these are the pillars of religion. Sometimes such a person strives to surpass himself and is therefore unable to fulfill his promises. Another difficulty is the overemphasis on sexual power. The solution is to broaden the goal to include social and cultural forms.

Aspects of Saturn - Vesta horoscope

Intense concentration and dedication. Harmonious aspects: self-discipline, seriousness of purpose and the ability to realize aspirations and hopes through hard work and dedication. Once realized, these aspirations are based on a solid and reliable foundation. Devotion to your home and obligations. (Gauguin, conjunction in Pisces, in opposition to Ceres in Virgo, left his wife and five children to follow his artistic calling in Polynesia. Nietzsche, in Aquarius, in the 2nd house).

Tense: Conflict between personal needs and responsibilities to others. The desire to avoid obligations or suffering under the burden of excessively heavy responsibility. High standard of excellence for yourself and others. Problems may stem from preoccupation with work, excessive ambition or sexual inhibitions. The solution to problems is to develop a harmonious approach to the performance of duty in such a way as to experience personal joy and satisfaction from it.

Aspects of Uranus - Vesta horoscope

Original or universal impulses on which a personal calling is based. Harmonious Aspects: A mind that concentrates on new or intuitive ideas. Scientific or occult research. The ability to commit oneself to new political, spiritual and religious views. Such people sometimes defend sexual freedom and the principle of non-possession in sexual relationships.

Tense: conflict between concentration on business and the desire for new things and changes. This can lead to rebellion against commitment and anarchic behavior. In sexual behavior, deviations from traditional sexual ethical codes. The solution to the problem is to devote oneself to innovations and reforms that would provide constructive changes in the old order, or the construction of functional structures of the new order. (Leonardo da Vinci, opposition).

Aspects of Neptune - Vesta horoscope

Devotion to spiritual or artistic ideals. Harmonious aspects: sexual union as a means of achieving the mystical unity of Neptune. The depth of compassion that can lead to dedication to serving the world. Spiritual or artistic calling (Salvador Dali,<фотограф снов>, many of which have a sexual interpretation - connection).

Tense: scattering of goals and lack of understanding of obligations. An incorrect perception of reality that leads to unnecessary self-denial and self-sacrifice. Spiritual or sexual disappointments or avoidance of work. The solution to the problem is to use the power of Vesta in order to effectively interact with physical reality and other dimensions (Goya, the exponent of the reality of the unconscious, is the opposition).

Aspects of Pluto - Vesta horoscope

A sense of destiny to transform society. Harmonious aspects: the ability to focus large amounts of energy to achieve a different reality. Transforming sexuality for regeneration, healing and enlightenment. This aspect may indicate a calling to use power to serve spiritual or social ideals.

Tense: the conflict between the use of power for personal and impersonal purposes. This can lead to the desire for power being blocked and released in destructive ways. Obsessive sexual desires, exaggerated fear of death, paranoia and excessive self-preoccupation may occur. There may also be a feeling of social isolation. The solution to the problem is to focus efforts on constructive social change. (Hitler, semi-square).

Demeter George, astrologer

The Dawn spacecraft captured this image on July 17, 2011. It was located about 15,000 kilometers (9,500 miles) from Vesta. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA.

Vesta is the second most massive object in the asteroid belt, second only to Ceres, which is classified as a dwarf planet. Vesta, the brightest asteroid in the sky, is sometimes visible from Earth with the naked eye. This is the first asteroid visited by a spacecraft. The Dawn mission showed us Vesta in 2011, providing new data about this rocky world.

In 1596, after studying planetary orbits, Johannes Kepler came to the conclusion that a planet must exist in the region between Mars and Jupiter. Mathematical calculations by Johann Daniel Titius and Johann Elert Bode in 1772, later known as the Titius-Bode law, seemed to support this prediction. In August 1798, a group of astronomers began searching for this missing planet. Among the latter was the German astronomer Heinrich Olbers. Olbers discovered the second asteroid known at that time - Pallas. In his letter to astronomers, he outlined the theory of the origin of these asteroids.

“Perhaps Ceres and Pallas are just a couple of fragments ... of a once larger planet that once lay between Mars and Jupiter,” he wrote.

Olbers believed that the fragments of this planet would intersect at the point of destruction and on the opposite side of the orbit. He observed these two regions and discovered Vesta on March 29, 1807, becoming the first person to discover two asteroids.

Vesta is unique among asteroids in that the light and dark areas on its surface are similar to those on the Moon. Ground-based observations have shown that the asteroid has basaltic areas, which suggests that lava flowed along its surface in the past. It has an irregular shape, approximately the same as an oblate spheroid.

As Vesta approached Earth in 1996, the Hubble Space Telescope imaged some of the object's topographical features. For example, a large crater at the south pole, the average diameter of which is about 460 kilometers, while Vesta itself is only 530 kilometers across. The crater is about 13 kilometers deep and was most likely formed by a major collision early in the asteroid's life. The material ejected from this collision resulted in a number of smaller vestoid asteroids that orbited their parent, as well as meteorites that crashed into Earth.

Unlike most asteroids, Vesta's structure is differentiated. Like planets, the asteroid has a crust of cooled lava that covers a rocky mantle and an iron-nickel core. These properties are an argument in favor of the fact that Vesta should be considered a protoplanet and not an asteroid.

In fact, if not for Jupiter, Vesta would have a good chance of becoming a planet.

“The velocities in the asteroid belt were really high, and the higher the velocities, the harder it is for planetesimals to come together,” said David O'Brien, a fellow at the institute in Tucson, Arizona.

In 1960, a fireball that streaked across the skies over Australia was later found to be part of Vesta. Composed almost entirely of pyroxene, the meteorite has the same spectral characteristics as Vesta.

In October 2010, the Hubble Space Telescope focused on Vesta again. The findings showed that the asteroid's tilt is about four degrees greater than researchers previously thought. This data helped NASA place the Dawn spacecraft in polar orbit around the asteroid.

The Dawn spacecraft, which has been studying the asteroid since 2012, has discovered that there is a surprisingly large amount of hydrogen on the surface of the rocky body. He also discovered bright reflective areas that may have appeared after his birth.

“Our analysis shows that this bright material has not changed significantly since Vesta formed more than 4 billion years ago,” said Jian-Yang Li.

Vesta's south pole has a huge mountain that reaches an altitude of over 20 kilometers (65,000 feet), making it almost as tall as Olympus Mons on Mars. Olympus is the largest mountain (and volcano) in the solar system. It rises 24 kilometers (15 miles) above the surface of Mars.

In addition, astronomers believe that liquid water existed on the asteroid. Images taken by the Dawn spacecraft captured curved gullies and fan-shaped deposits in eight different craters on Vesta. All eight craters are believed to have formed in the last few hundred million years, which is relatively recent for a 4.5 billion-year-old asteroid.

“No one expected to find evidence of water on Vesta because its surface is so cold and it has no atmosphere, causing any water on its surface to evaporate quickly,” Jennifer Scully, a graduate student at Vesta, said in a statement. University of Los Angeles.

Dawn also found evidence of hydrated minerals (materials containing water molecules) on Vesta's surface, which could also hint at the presence of subsurface ice.

The solar system is divided into two main parts by a wide gap between Mars (the outer of the inner planets) and Jupiter (the first of the giant planets). Numerical relationships between planets' distances from the Sun, known as Bode's law, led astronomers to speculate that there must be another planet in the gap. At the end of the 18th century, a group of astronomers led by I. Schröter (1746 - 1816) and von Zach (1754 - 1832) organized a kind of “sky patrol”, the main task of which was to discover a new planet. But they were ahead of them.

New discoveries: minor planets

On New Year's Eve 1801, Piazzi (1746 - 1826) of Palermo, Sicily, discovered a star-like body that moved noticeably from night to night. It turned out to be a planet moving between Mars and Jupiter. She was named Ceres in honor of the goddess - the patroness of Sicily. Over the next few years, the “sky patrol” discovered three more planets: Pallas, Juno and Vesta. Together with Ceres, they were called “minor planets” or asteroids. All of them, except Ceres, are less than 500 km in diameter. Only Vesta can sometimes be visible to the naked eye.

There were no other asteroids found, and the "patrol" was disbanded. However, in 1845, Karl Henke (1793 - 1866) discovered the fifth asteroid - Astraea, and since 1850 not a year has passed without such discoveries. The total number of small planets can exceed 50 thousand.

In 1977, a faint 19th magnitude object was discovered between Saturn and Uranus, moving at an average distance from the Sun of 2600 million km. This unusual asteroid, probably about 1000 km in diameter, was named Chiron. It has been suggested that it was once a satellite of Saturn.

Unusual orbits

Not all asteroids stay in their specific area all the time. In 1888, Carl Witt of Copenhagen discovered minor planet No. 433, Eros, which could go far into the orbit of Mars and at times even approach the Earth at a distance not exceeding 24 million km, as happened in 1931 and then in 1975. In 1931, Eros was heavily monitored because an accurate calculation of its orbit could help determine the astronomical unit - the distance from the Earth to the Sun. Eros has an elongated shape with dimensions of approximately 27 x 16 km. Although Eros is small, it is still larger than such asteroids that come close to the Earth, such as Hermes (with a diameter of only about 1 km), which in 1937 almost “blowed away the dust” from the Earth, passing from it at a distance of only 780 thousand km, which is less than twice the distance to the Moon. A collision of the Earth with such asteroids would lead to very destructive consequences, although the likelihood of a direct collision of this kind is very low.

One asteroid, Icarus, approaches the Sun closer than Mercury. Apparently, there is no other body in the Solar System that would undergo such monstrous temperature changes. At the point of its orbit closest to the Sun, at a distance of 28 million km from it, the surface temperature of Icarus should exceed 500°C. At aphelion (the farthest point of the orbit), after just 200 days, it is already at a distance of 295 million km - significantly further than the most distant point of Mars’ orbit.

On the other hand, asteroid #944, Hidalgo, has an elongated orbit that takes it almost beyond the orbit of Saturn, and two groups of Trojan asteroids move in the orbit of Jupiter. One group is constantly about 60 degrees ahead of Jupiter, and the other is 60 degrees behind it, there is no danger of collision. Although the Trojans are quite large on the scale of asteroids, they are so far from Earth that they are very poorly visible.

Through a telescope, asteroids look like stars. The only way to recognize them is to detect their movement from night to night. Asteroids are now being discovered photographically. Often, during the exposure, the asteroid manages to move so much that an elongated trace, rather than a dot, remains in the frame. Therefore, asteroids cause a lot of trouble for astronomers. Often photographs exhibited for other purposes turn out to be dotted with numerous traces of asteroids, and identifying each of them takes a lot of time.

The composition of the asteroids is not yet fully known, but Mariner 9 photographs of two of Mars' moons (Phobos and Deimos), which may well be asteroids captured by the planet, suggest that the surfaces of many of them may be covered with craters. The outer satellites of the Jupiter family, Phoebe near Saturn, Nereid near Neptune can also be “captured” asteroids.

Origin of asteroids

The origin of the asteroids is still unknown. According to one hypothesis, they are fragments of a former planet (or planets) that revolved around the Sun beyond the orbit of Mars and suffered some kind of catastrophe in the distant past. But overall it seems more likely that the asteroids were never part of a larger body.

Vesta (lat. Vesta) is one of the largest asteroids in the main asteroid belt. Among asteroids it ranks first in mass (2.59·10*20 kg) and second in size after Pallas. Before Ceres was recognized as a dwarf planet, Vesta was considered the third asteroid in size after it and Pallas, and second in mass, second only to Ceres. It is also the brightest asteroid of all and the only one that can be observed without effort with the naked eye. Vesta was discovered on March 29, 1807 by Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers and, at the suggestion of Karl Gauss, received the name of the ancient Roman goddess of home and hearth, Vesta.

The dimensions of Vesta are 578 × 560 × 458 km, and if the asymmetry of the shape were a little less, then, according to the refined classification of solar system bodies, it should be classified as a dwarf planet. Vesta is also similar to the planets due to its complex geological history.

On September 27, 2007, the NASA space probe Dawn was launched to the asteroid.

Dawn has helped reveal new details about the asteroid Vesta, including surface composition, temperature changes and clues to its internal structure. The results will help scientists better understand the early processes in the solar system that dominated the dawn of its formation. The spacecraft conducted research from altitudes of 680 and 210 km from the surface. His data shows differences in surface mineral composition and topography. The main constituents of Vesta, identified by Dawn, are iron and magnesium, which are often found in volcanic rocks of the Earth. The images also show smooth plains that appear to be deposits formed by fine dust from meteorite impacts. The resulting images reveal an amazing variety of processes that color Vesta's surface in different shades. At Tarpeia Crater near the asteroid's South Pole, Dawn revealed clusters of minerals that appear as shiny layers on the steep slopes of the crater. Studying the deep layers allows scientists to see the geological history of the asteroid, while layers closer to the surface reveal contamination of Vesta from meteorite bombardment. Frequent landslides on the slopes of craters revealed hidden compositional patterns.

Dawn obtained surface temperature maps. Data shows temperatures range from -18 degrees Celsius in the sunniest locations to -100 degrees Celsius in the shade.

Using photographs from the Rassvet spacecraft, researchers compiled an atlas of the asteroid. “Creating the atlas was a labor-intensive task - about 400 photographs were used to compile each sheet. The atlas shows how great the differences in heights are on the surface of such a small body as Vesta. At the south pole, the depth of the Severin crater reaches 18 kilometers, and after only a few hundred kilometers a seven-kilometer mountain peak rises from it,” said one of the authors of the atlas, Thomas Roach, an employee of the German aerospace agency DLR.

Before the Dawn mission, scientists believed they had a fairly accurate theory of the formation of the Vesta asteroid. But the data obtained by the spacecraft suggests that its history is much more complex than expected.

If Vesta's formation process was similar to the formation scenario of rocky planets like ours, then the temperature of the core would have created distinct, separate layers of rock (typically the core, mantle and crust). In this case, the mineral olivine should have concentrated in the mantle. Olivine is a typical deep-seated high-temperature mineral. It is common in many types of meteorites, in mantle rocks, in igneous and high-temperature metamorphic and metasomatic rocks. Rock-forming mineral of ultrabasic igneous rocks - olivinites, dunites, etc.

However, as described in a recent Nature paper, this is not the case, as evidenced by infrared mapping by the Dawn Spectrometer. Observations of large craters in the southern hemisphere of Vesta that are deep enough to affect the mantle have found no evidence of olivine there. At the same time, scientists have discovered clear signs of olivine in the surface material of the northern hemisphere.

"The absence of olivine at the bottom of deep craters in the southern hemisphere of Vesta and its unexpected discovery in the northern hemisphere indicate a more complex evolution than previously thought," said Maria Cristina De Sanctis, director of the Dawn project at the National Institute of Astrophysics in Rome, Italy.

It is possible that Vesta was only in a partially molten state when formed, which formed local areas with olivine, rather than a global layer. It is also possible that the mantle in Vesta's southern hemisphere was covered with other material after its formation, which prevented Dawn from observing the olivine underneath.

The Dawn spacecraft is currently flying to its second destination, the dwarf planet Ceres, which is the largest member in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The estimated time of arrival at Ceres is early 2015.