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jdh
July 6th, 2007, 05:32 PM
"Dawn" to liftoff to Ceres

"NASA's Asteroid Probe Set for Monday Launch
By Tariq Malik posted: 6 July 2007

"NASA is hoping for a Monday liftoff for the Dawn spacecraft, a probe bound to visit the two largest asteroids in the solar system.
...
"Dawn's planned Monday launch will kick off an eight-year trip to Vesta and Ceres, the two largest space rocks in the Asteroid Belt that rings the Sun between the planets Mars and Jupiter. ... "

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/070706_dawn_update.html

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Colonization of Ceres
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Ceres has been proposed[1][2] as one possible target for human colonization in the inner solar system."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_Ceres

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Ceres (dwarf planet)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Ceres (IPA: /?s?r.iz/, Latin: Cere-s), also designated 1 Ceres (see minor planet names), is the smallest dwarf planet in the Solar System and the only one located in the main asteroid belt. ... Recent observations have revealed that it is spherical, unlike the irregular shapes of smaller bodies with less gravity."

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For math and physics fans:

"To recover Ceres, Carl Friedrich Gauss, then only 24 years old, developed a method of orbit determination from three observations. In only a few weeks, he predicted its path, and sent his results to Franz Xaver, Baron von Zach, the editor of the Monatliche Correspondenz. On December 31, 1801, von Zach and Heinrich W. M. Olbers unambiguously confirmed the recovery of Ceres."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceres_(dwarf_planet)

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DH

Judy G. Russell
July 6th, 2007, 09:42 PM
"smallest dwarf planet in the Solar System"Oh good grief... a Pluto wannabe???

jdh
July 6th, 2007, 10:36 PM
Oh good grief... a Pluto wannabe???

Since Pluto is Disney, maybe it should be Corn Flakes instead of Ceres ?