Ceres Should Have More Craters. So What Wiped Them Away?

(Credit: SwRI/Simone Marchi) Most dwarf planets and solar system bodies similar to Ceres’ size possess many large impact craters from billions of years of being bashed into by other space debris during the formation of the solar system. But one place where this isn't the case? Ceres, the largest object in a field full of formation debris. In a new study published in Nature Communications, a team of researchers from the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) found that Ceres lacks the size and distribution of large craters that the researchers were expecting to see on the surface.