DAWN GRAND MAP CERES: Global Hydrogen Concentration Map of Asteroid Ceres

A global map of hydrogen concentration within the regolith of asteroid 1 Ceres on twenty-degree quasi-equal-area pixels. Concentrations were determined from thermal and epithermal neutron data acquired by NASA's Dawn mission GRaND instrument from a low altitude mapping orbit about 385 km from the surface. The data represent bulk regolith to depths up to a few decimeters with a spatial resolution of about 600-km full-width-at-half-maximum.

Use Cases

• Modeling the distribution of water ice or hydrated minerals on Ceres based on hydrogen concentration data.
• Analyzing the relationship between surface geology and subsurface hydrogen content based on the global map.
• Validating or comparing neutron spectroscopy data processing methods for planetary bodies.
• Studying the bulk composition and volatile history of dwarf planets based on regolith hydrogen measurements.

Strengths

• Data originates from NASA's Dawn mission, a primary scientific source for Ceres.
• Hydrogen concentrations are derived from the Gamma Ray and Neutron Detector (GRaND) instrument.
• Spatial resolution is specified as about 600-km full-width-at-half-maximum.
• The methodology is described in a referenced scientific publication (PRETTYMANETAL2017).

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• The spatial resolution of about 600 km is coarse for detailed local analysis.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Collection Method

Thermal and epithermal neutron counting data from the Dawn mission's Gamma Ray and Neutron Detector (GRaND).

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 03:45:04.590791; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Asteroid 1 Ceres (global coverage).