American space agency NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has recently sent back home images of dwarf planet Ceres. The images focus on the mysterious bright spots in a crater on Ceres.

The NASA team has found that the rim of the Occator crater is almost vertical in some places, and rises steeply for almost two kilometers.

The latest images have provided NASA experts the closest views of the crater with better-defined shapes of the spots, which scientists will use to research the spots.

Chief engineer and mission director Marc Rayman said, “Dawn has transformed what was so recently a few bright dots into a complex and beautiful, gleaming landscape. Soon, the scientific analysis will reveal the geological and chemical nature of this mysterious and mesmerizing extra-terrestrial scenery”.

As per the agency, the images were taken at an altitude of 1,470km during Dawn’s third 11-day cycle of mapping Ceres’ surface. The Dawn craft will map Ceres at total six times over the next two months, with each mapping cycle requiring 14 orbits and allowing scientists to create stereo views and 3D maps it added.

The Dawn spacecraft arrived at Ceres on March 6, after orbiting protoplanet Vesta in 2011 and 2012. The craft after entering the orbit at around the 587-mile diet planet, it provided scientists with an unparalleled up-close view of the largest object in the main Asteroid Belt.

Dawn is the first mission to visit a dwarf planet, and the first to orbit two distinct solar system targets.