Dawn stays longer

The NASA double-asteroid mission, ion propulsion Dawn has been authorized to spend an extra 40 days in orbit around Vesta, its first destination.   The next destination is the biggest asteroid, Ceres.  So I guess that they worked out the orbital mechanics and propulsion speed and such so that Dawn can leave on August 26 and still get to Ceres on time.

Dawn gets extra time to explore Vesta

There are some new color maps of Vesta available here.

It still makes me astounded and happy that we have such agile and capable robotic satellites exploring our Solar System.