Surface Heterogeneity of the dwarf-planet Haumea

With it being approximately 2000 x 1600 x 1000 km in size, (136108) Haumea's extreme elongation makes it unique among known dwarf planets. The shape of this fascinating Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) is the result of a rotational deformation due to its extremely short 3.9-hour rotation period (Rabinowitz et al. 2006) which could be explained by a past dramatic collision (Brown et al. 2007 ; Ragozzine & Brown 2007; Snodgrass et al. 2010). Although a high bulk density estimated at a range of 2.6 to 3.3 g.cm-3 (Rabinowitz et al. 2006) suggests a more rocky composition than other KBOs, Haumea and its satellites are considered by a crystalline water-ice multiple system (Dumas et al. 2011). Moreover, Haumea has become the second Kuiper Belt Object after Pluto to show observable signs of surface features. Indeed, a region darker and redder than average on the surface of Haumea has been identified (Lacerda, 2010). In this contribution, we present Spectro-Imaging observations of Haumea obtained in the Near Infra- Red [1.6 to 2.4 μm] with the integral-field spectrograph SINFONI mounted on UT4 at the ESO Very Large Telescope. We present some results combining data from several epochs.