The Global Scale Relaxation State of Ceres

Abstract:

Planetary surfaces relax over time to a hydrostatic configuration at a rate governed by a body’s rheological properties. Because rheology is a strong function of composition and temperature, observations of a body’s relaxation state offers a means to probe its interior structure and thermal evolution. In the case of Ceres, such analysis potentially constrains the hydration state of the rocky core, the rock content of the ice-rich shell, and the abundance of heat-producing radionuclides.

Ground-based observations of Ceres suggested that the long-wavelength topography of Ceres has undergone significant relaxation, closely approaching hydrostatic equilibrium. Recent preliminary data from the Dawn spacecraft show that the topography of Ceres exhibits anomalously low power at the longest wavelengths (exceeding ~150 km; spherical harmonic degree n = 20; Fig. 1).

Using the deal.II finite element library, we model global scale (n < 40) viscoelastoplastic relaxation on Ceres to constrain the range of compositional and thermal structures consistent with the observed topography. Simulations assuming a 60 km thick pure ice layer overlying a rocky interior suggests that medium wavelength topography (10 ≤ n ≤ 40) relaxes efficiently over timescales of << 1 My, while relaxation at n ≤ 8 occurs only over much longer timescales as determined by the rheology of the deep interior (Fig. 1). The comparable degrees of relaxation observed on Ceres at all spherical harmonic degrees less than 20 therefore suggest that the rheological contrast between the shell and core is less extreme than that of pure ice and dry rock. Potential explanations include: (1) the presence of silicates and dissolved contaminants in the ice-rich shell and (2) high temperatures (e.g., >400˚C given a wet olivine rheology) in the deep interior during Ceres’s early evolution. Ongoing simulations will test the viability of these scenarios in reproducing the observed topography.