A probe from NASA is expected to enter the orbit of the dwarf planet Ceres and study the object like never before. Several researchers say that the planet is capable of supporting life as we know it.

In March 2015, the NASA's Dawn spacecraft will arrive in the orbit of the dwarf planet Ceres. It is known as the largest object in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

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The planet itself is relatively warm and wet. These characteristics are what allow Ceres to be mentioned in the same breath as the Jovian moon Europa and the Saturn satellite Enceladus; all of which are hopefuls for the search of a new habitable planet.

"I don't think Ceres is less interesting in terms of astrobiology than other potentially habitable worlds," Jian-Yang Li, of the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona, said during a talk at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

She went on to say that life requires three main ingredients, namely: liquid water, an energy source, and certain chemical building blocks. These include carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorous, and sulfur.

Ceres is about 580 miles or 950 kilometers wide. It is thought to hold a lot of water which is based on its low overall density of 2.09 grams per cubic centimetre as compared to the 5.5 g/cubic cm for Earth.

Researchers suggest that Ceres is likely a differentiated body with a rocky core and a mantle comprised of water ice and water bearing-minerals that have been detected on its surface. Water appears to make up about 40 percent of Ceres' volume.

"Ceres is actually the largest water reservoir in the inner solar system other than the Earth," he said. However, it's unclear at the moment how much, if any, of this water is liquid, he added.

Li says that currently, the only missing piece of information is that we don't know much about the outgassing on Ceres.

For this, the Dawn will be able to provide invaluable evidence on the situation.

TagsCeres, NASA, dawn, Support life