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GSA Connects 2023 Meeting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Paper No. 94-2
Presentation Time: 8:00 AM-5:30 PM

CONSTRUCTIONAL HILLFORMS MAY BE PERVASIVE ON CERES: A COMPARATIVE STUDY USING TERRESTRIAL AND CEREAN GEOMORPHOLOGY


GARCIA, Alex1, HUGHSON, Kynan1, SCULLY, Jennifer2, SIZEMORE, Hanna3, SCHENK, P.M.4 and SCHMIDT, Britney E.5, (1)Department of Geological Sciences, University of Alaska Anchorage, 3211 Providence Drive, Anchorage, AK 99508, (2)Universities Space Research Association, 3600 Bay Area Boulevard, Houston, TX 77058, (3)Planetary Science Institute, Tucson, AZ 85719-2395, (4)NASA Ames Research Center, Space Science Division, MS-245-3, Moffett Field, CA 95129, (5)Department of Astronomy, Cornell, Ithaca, NY 14850

High-resolution imagery from the final phase of NASA’s Dawn mission revealed the surface of the dwarf planet Ceres to host several distinct morphological populations of small, quasi-conical, hills within Occator crater (Hughson et al., 2022). Many of these hills display Earth-like geomorphologies indicative of a constructional origin, likely via solid-state flow or a hydrologic origin, though their true nature remains elusive.

In this study, we expand upon the work of Hughson et al. (2022) by using remote sensing mapping techniques to identify and classify the morphology of small anomalous hills within the cerean equatorial cratered terrain between Occator and Urvara craters. Furthermore, we collected a geomorphological database of terrestrial hills with unique genetic origins to quantitatively compare with our newly identified features on Ceres. We characterized the morphology of terrestrial hillforms, such as drumlins; karstic hills; and scoria cones, using ArcticDEM and Shuttle Radar Topography. We then measured the size and shape of these hillforms and comparatively analyzed their population statistics with those of our identified hills on Ceres between Occator and Urvara craters.

Our initial findings show that small quasi-conical hills are visible in the highest resolution Dawn images, and exist on Ceres outside of the large craters Occator and Urvara. We also identified populations of these features on Ceres that share common morphologies and form in clusters. This behavior is similar to what has previously been observed in Occator, suggesting that both of these cerean populations share a process origin.

These results provide new insights into the formation and evolution of hillforms on Ceres. They also highlight the benefits of using terrestrial geomorphologic data to interpret the geology of other bodies in the solar system.

References: Hughson et al., 2022, Geology, https://doi.org/10.1130/G49321.1

Session No. 94--Booth# 11

D10. Planetary Geology Potpourri: When One World Just Isn’t Enough (Posters)
Monday, 16 October 2023: 8:00 AM-5:30 PM
Hall B (David L Lawrence Convention Center)
Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 55, No. 6
doi: 10.1130/abs/2023AM-392211
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