Results tagged “saturn” from 60 Second Science

Last Wednesday, the Cassini spacecraft whizzed through a giant geyser bursting from the surface of Enceladus, one of Saturn's tiny moons. Cassini’s cameras were poised to take new pictures of Enceladus, and an onboard tool was supposed to analyze the composition of the geyser.

Those Enceladan outbursts, hundreds of miles tall, are curious beasts. Scientists suspect they contain ice and rocky debris, but how such a small and cold body can host these powerful plumes remains a mystery. Is there a watery ocean trapped under the frozen surface? Where does all this energy come from? To add mystery to mystery, last month, we learned that Saturn’s outermost ring actually sops up debris from the geysers.

Well, at least Cassini’s camera worked! (The image above is from NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.) And so did four of the other devices. The new pictures deliver new details on the polar regions of the moon, which is only about 310 miles in diameter. But we’ll have to wait a few months for an inside look at the geysers.

Continue reading 'We’ll get you, Enceladus. Just you wait.' >

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Strange flying-saucer-shaped moons embedded in Saturn's rings have baffled scientists studying images transmitted by the ESA's Cassini Spacecraft. New research suggests that the oddly shaped moons, Pan and Atlas, are born largely from clumps of icy particles in the rings themselves, a discovery that could shed light on how Earth and other planets formerd from the disk of matter that once surrounded our newborn sun.

Animation of the moon's formation after the jump...

Continue reading 'How Saturn's 'UFO' Moons formed [video]' >

This audio recording of radio waves created by the various auroras coming off of Saturn was recorded a few years ago by the Cassini-Huygens mission, but that can't keep this hepcat from gettin' down to this gas giant's ca-raaaazy groove!

Continue reading 'Hey, Saturn -- neat sounds!' >

NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute/University of Colorado

Remember the first time you saw the rings of Saturn? They're mysterious and beautiful, eerie and perfect, and 10 years ago, NASA's Cassini spacecraft blasted off to explore them.

The most recent report from Cassini's voyage to the Great Ringed One suggests that the disks are the result of cosmic catastrophes. The outermost main ring, called the "A" ring, is littered with tiny holes shaped like airplane propellers. In the most recent issue of Nature, astronomers report that these propeller-shaped gaps point to the existence of thousands of "moonlets," giant boulders (some as large as city blocks) embedded in the ring of dust.

Continue reading 'Demolition derby in Saturn's outer ring' >