Ursula is the second-largest

impact crater An impact crater is a depression (geology), depression in the surface of a solid astronomical body formed by the hypervelocity impact event, impact of a smaller object. In contrast to volcanic craters, which result from explosion or internal c ...

known on

Uranus Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gaseous cyan-coloured ice giant. Most of the planet is made of water, ammonia, and methane in a Supercritical fluid, supercritical phase of matter, which astronomy calls "ice" or Volatile ( ...

moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It Orbit of the Moon, orbits around Earth at Lunar distance, an average distance of (; about 30 times Earth diameter, Earth's diameter). The Moon rotation, rotates, with a rotation period (lunar ...

Titania. It is about 135 km across, and is cut by Belmont Chasma. It is named after Hero's attendant in

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

's comedy ''

Much Ado About Nothing ''Much Ado About Nothing'' is a Shakespearean comedy, comedy by William Shakespeare thought to have been written in 1598 and 1599.See textual notes to ''Much Ado About Nothing'' in ''The Norton Shakespeare'' (W. W. Norton & Company, 1997 ) p. ...

''; the name Ursula was officially adopted by the

International Astronomical Union The International Astronomical Union (IAU; , UAI) is an international non-governmental organization (INGO) with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach, education, and developmen ...

(IAU) in 1988.

Geology and characteristics

With a diameter of approximately 135 kilometers, Ursula is the second-largest known impact feature on Titania, after Gertrude. Ursula is disrupted by a series of parallel chasms. The crater has a flat floor, and Ursula has what appears to be a central pit with diameter of about 20 km. However, the structure is more likely to be a series of depressions due to multiple tectonic faults breaking up the crater floor. It is probably one of the youngest large impact craters on Titania. The crater is surrounded by smooth plains, which have the lowest impact crater density of all geological units on the moon, although they are cut by Belmont Chasma. Though the smooth plains could represent an

ejecta blanket An ejecta blanket is a generally symmetrical apron of ejecta that surrounds an impact crater; it is layered thickly at the crater's rim and thin to discontinuous at the blanket's outer edge. The impact cratering is one of the basic surface format ...

, with material blasted out from the

impact event An impact event is a collision between astronomical objects causing measurable effects. Impact events have been found to regularly occur in planetary systems, though the most frequent involve asteroids, comets or meteoroids and have minimal effe ...

that created Ursula obliterating nearby craters, the lack of similar deposits around Titania's other large craters suggest a cryovolcanic origin. This makes the regions surrounding Ursula one of the only identified candidate cryovolcanic features on Titania, and may be analogous to the smooth plains of

Saturn Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant, with an average radius of about 9 times that of Earth. It has an eighth the average density of Earth, but is over 95 tim ...

's moons Dione and Tethys.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ursula (Crater) Impact craters on Uranus' moons Titania (moon)