In July 2018, NASA released a comparison of physical features, including Ahuna Mons, found on Ceres with similar ones present on Earth.

[9] It is roughly antipodal to the largest impact basin on Ceres, 280 km (170 mi) diameter Kerwan.

Seismic energy from the Kerwan-forming impact may have been focused on the opposite side of Ceres, fracturing the outer layers of the area and facilitating the movement of high viscosity cryovolcanic magma (consisting of muddy water ice softened by its content of salts) that was then extruded onto the surface.

[10][11] Crater counts suggest that formation of the mountain continued into the last several hundred million years, making this a relatively young geological feature.

[8] Ahuna Mons is associated with a positive mass anomaly, or mascon, centered about 32–36 km (20–22 mi) below it, not far above the crust-mantle boundary.