Monday, 8 September 2014

ceres - Age of Occator Crater

Has any official information been published regarding the estimated age of the Occator crater on Ceres? I ran some quick searches but couldn't find anything putting a definitive (or even speculative) date on the moment of impact.



I ask because based upon my own very amateur analysis of the imagery:



enter image description here



...there seems to be a marked decrease in the amount of secondary cratering visible within a fairly uniform radius of the main crater.



My assumption is that when the impact occurred, the surrounding area was likely blanketed by material kicked up from the impact site, obscuring most pre-existing craters (smaller ones, in particular). Kind of like fresh snowfall, except made of rock.



So for a (small) secondary crater to be visible near Occator, the impact would have to have occurred after the impact that created Occator crater. Meaning that the relative lack of small craters near Occator would seem to imply a fairly recent impact ("recent" in terms of Ceres geological timescales), I believe?



Is there any official data that would confirm or refute this?

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