Serene Scene
Even in a peaceful looking scene such as this one of Saturn and its moon Tethys, the Cassini spacecraft reveals clues about how Saturn is ever-changing. Saturn’s northern hemisphere still shows the scars of the huge storm that raged through much of 2011 (see PIA14905). And, day by day, the shadows cast by the rings on the planet’s southern hemisphere are growing wider as the seasons progress toward northern summer. See PIA11667 and PIA09793 to learn about the changing seasons and the shadows cast by the rings.
Tethys (660 miles, or 1,062 kilometers across) appears above the rings to the left of the center of the image.
The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on Jan. 10, 2012 using a spectral filter sensitive to wavelengths of near-infrared light centered at 752 nanometers. The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 1.4 million miles (2.3 million kilometers) from Saturn and at a Sun-Saturn-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 39 degrees. Image scale on Saturn is 84 miles (136 kilometers) per pixel.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
The bird that flies nicer than others
I watched a TV show, where they showed different birds in flight. It was like the top 10 birds that fly beautifully. Heron won.
I already have a blog in Russian, and I want to do the same here. Sign Up! You only need to write there own dreams. The more you write them, the better they are remembered. I very much hope that we will be a lot. Thank you
Saturn’s Brightly Reflective Moon Enceladus
A brightly reflective Enceladus appears before Saturn’s rings, while the planet’s larger moon Titan looms in the distance.
Jets of water ice and vapor emanating from the south pole of Enceladus, which hint at subsurface sea rich in organics, and liquid hydrocarbons ponding on the surface on the surface of Titan make these two of the most fascinating moons in the Saturnian system.
Enceladus (313 miles, or 504 kilometers across) is in the center of the image. Titan (3,200 miles, or 5,150 kilometers across) glows faintly in the background beyond the rings. This view looks toward the anti-Saturn side of Enceladus and the Saturn-facing side of Titan. The northern, sunlit side of the rings is seen from just above the ringplane.
The image was taken in visible green light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on March 12, 2012. The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 600,000 miles (1 million kilometers) from Enceladus and at a Sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 36 degrees. Image scale is 4 miles (6 kilometers) per pixel on Enceladus.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
