Released November 9, 2009, this image from Cassini shows the northern night side of Saturn sending a deep shadow across its rings while the 700-mile-wide Dione looks on. The shepherd moon Pandora can be seen here as well, orbiting just outside the thin F ring, at center. The Cassini spacecraft was over 800,000 miles from…
Tag: science
Composition in White
949-mile-wide Rhea floats in front of the rings and the brightly-lit face of Saturn in this image from Cassini, taken on November 8. The face of Saturn, overexposed here in order to see detail in the rings and Rhea, appears as bright white, making a dramatic studio backdrop. The planet’s uppermost atmospheric haze is also…
Now that’s a big shadow!
This was a suprising find amongst the raw images from Cassini this evening….a photo of Saturn, similar to the one I posted previously, but with a massive shadow cast upon its southern hemisphere. I presume it’s from Titan, somewhere out of frame, based upon its size and hazy edges (indicative of the big moon’s thick…
Along the Edge
Moons Rhea and Enceladus orbit along the ringplane in this view from Cassini, taken November 6, 2009. That is, I think it’s Rhea and Enceladus in this image. It’s hard to tell for sure from this distance. (Cassini was over 1.2 million miles from Saturn when this was shot.) If anyone knows for sure, I’m…
Electric Blue
Yesterday’s Astronomy Picture of the Day was this fantastic image by the talented Alan Friedman, showing the sphere of our Sun taken in a special wavelength of light emitted by hydrogen gas and then inverted to look blue. Incredible details of the Sun’s surface – the chromosphere – become visible, most notably the texture…
KAGUYA’s Lunar Legacy
On Monday JAXA released more footage taken by the KAGUYA orbiter during its lunar mapping mission. KAGUYA spent several months flying over the moon at altitudes ranging from 10-50km (about 6-30 miles) taking video with its high-definition camera before finally ending its mission and crash landing onto the moon on June 10, 2009. The sequence…
Now With 6% More Mercury!
With the third and last flyby of Mercury by the MESSENGER spacecraft, NASA scientists have now imaged nearly 98 percent of the surface of the first planet from our sun. The photo above shows a color-calibrated view of a crescent Mercury, acquired on September 29. This will be the last close-up color image of Mercury…
No Editing Required
This raw image from Cassini requires no editing to be presentable…..it’s simply a beautiful shot of Mimas hovering in front of the rings with Saturn’s shadow cast across them. Simple, untouched beauty at its best. That little Cassini….he’s getting good at this. 🙂 Image: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
The Results Are In
The data is in from today’s flyby of Enceladus and the images so far have not disappointed! The moon’s characteristic southern jets are running at full power, seen above, backlit by the sun and thereby easily visible to Cassini’s cameras. Below are a couple more images, one of Enceladus’ illuminated icy face with Saturn’s ringplane…
Target: Enceladus
Later today, Monday, November 2, the Cassini spacecraft will execute another close flyby of Saturn’s moon Enceladus and take some highly detailed images of the south polar region – the source of the little moon’s enigmatic jets. We should hopefully see some image data returned by the afternoon. 🙂 The image above is a…
Full Spectrum
A beautiful natural-color calibrated image by Gordan Ugarkovic, showing the many subtle and varied hues of Saturn’s atmosphere and rings. Image: NASA/JPL/SSI/Gordan Ugarkovic.
Billions and Billions
Talk about lights in the dark! The image above is a low-res version of what amounts to 22 months of dedicated work by Central Michigan University astronomer Axel Mellinger, traveling across the United States and South Africa and assembling over 3,000 individual images to create the most extensive and detailed – and zoomable – portrait…
Lights in the Dark 