Ceres

Ceres is the largest object in the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter and is the only dwarf planet to be located in the inner solar system. It was the first object to be discovered in the asteroid belt when Giuseppe Piazzi spotted it in 1801. When Dawn arrived in 2015, it was the first dwarf planet to have a spacecraft flyby.

Ceres is much bigger than it other terrestrial neighbours, scientists also classed it as a dwarf planet in 2006 along sie Pluto which is 14 times bigger than Ceres, even though it makes up 25% of the asteroid belt's mass.

Ceres is named after the Roman goddess of corn and harvests. Coincidentally, the word cereal comes from the same name.

Size and Distance
Ceres is 1/3 the radius of Earth, with a radius of 296 miles (476 kilometres). Ceres would be as big as a poppy seed if Earth were a nickel.

Ceres is 2.8 astronomical units away from the Sun, with an average distance of 257 million miles (413 million kilometres). One astronomical unit (abbreviated as 'AU') is the equal distance from the Earth to the Sun. Sunlight takes 22 minutes to travel to Ceres.

Orbit and Rotation
To complete one rotation, Ceres takes 9 hours to fully complete its day-night cycle, making it the shortest day length in the solar system. A year on Ceres (the time it takes to complete one trip around the Sun), however, takes 4.6 Earth years (1,682 Earth days).

Ceres is tilted at an angle of 4 degrees with respect to the plane of its orbit. This means that Ceres spins almost upright and doesn't experience seasons.

Formation
When the rest of the solar system formed into its current state, about 4.5 billion years ago, gravity pulled swirling gas and dust to form the now known dwarf planet. Sometimes, scientists describe Ceres as a "embryonic planet" which means that the planet started to form but didn't quite finish. This was due to Jupiter's gravity preventing Ceres from become a fully formed planet. About 4 billion years ago, Ceres settled into the asteroid belt among the leftover pieces of planetary formation between Mars and Jupiter.

Structure
Ceres is similar to a terrestrial planet (examples include Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars) but is less dense. One of its similarities is its layered interior. Ceres' core hasn't exactly been identified, but are not clear. Ceres could probably have a solid core and a mantle composed of water and ice. 25% of water could compose most of Ceres. If this is correct, Ceres could have more water than Earth. Ceres' crust could be rocky and dusty with large salt deposits. The salts on Ceres aren't exactly table salt (sodium chloride), but instead are composed of different minerals such as magnesium sulphate.

Atmosphere
Ceres' atmosphere could contain water vapour, with it being very thin (as evidence suggests). The vapour could be produced by ice volcanoes or ice sublimating (transforming from solid to gas).

Magnetosphere
Scientists don't think Ceres has a magnetosphere.

Moons
Ceres has no confirmed moons.

Rings
Ceres has no confirmed rings.

Human Life
Ceres is unadaptable for human life.