Cassini/Huygens Mission Update Thread Pt. 2

[chew_on_this]

From CICLOPS:<br /><br />MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE<br />CASSINI IMAGING CENTRAL LABORATORY FOR OPERATIONS (CICLOPS)<br />SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE, BOULDER, COLORADO<br />http://ciclops.org<br />media@ciclops.org<br /><br /><br />Preston Dyches (720) 974-5859<br />Cassini Imaging Central Laboratory for Operations<br />Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.<br /><br />Carolina Martinez (818) 354-9382<br />Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.<br /><br />Erica Hupp/Dolores Beasley (202) 358-1237/1753<br />NASA Headquarters, Washington<br /><br />For Immediate Release: June 28, 2005<br /><br /><br />NASA'S CASSINI REVEALS LAKE-LIKE FEATURE ON TITAN<br /><br />Scientists are fascinated by a dark, lake-like feature recently observed on Saturn's moon Titan.<br /><br />NASA's Cassini spacecraft captured a series of images, released today, showing a marking, darker than anything else around it. It is remarkably lake-like, with smooth, shore-like boundaries unlike any seen previously on Titan.<br /><br />"I'd say this is definitely the best candidate we've seen so far for a liquid hydrocarbon lake on Titan," said Dr. Alfred McEwen, imaging team member and a professor at the University of Arizona, Tucson. The putative lake measures 230 kilometers by 70 kilometers (145 miles long by 45 miles) wide, about the size of Lake Ontario, on the U.S. Canadian border.<br /><br />The feature lies in Titan's cloudiest region, which is presumably the most likely site of recent methane rainfall. This, coupled with the shore-like smoothness of the feature's perimeter makes it hard for imaging scientists to resist some speculation about what might be filling the lake, if it indeed is one.<br /><br />Cassini imaging team member Dr. Tony DelGenio of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, said, "It's possible that some of the storms in this region are strong enough to make methane rain that reaches the surface. Given Tit

 

[phaze]

just a tiny bit to the lower right of the 'lake' is another tiny dark spot that might be a smaller version of the same thing.<br /><br />also, just to the lower right of that tiny spot (almost touching it) looks like some kind of larger grey (vs. black) blobular shape.<br /><br />

 

[paulolearysp]

Does anyone know if the CD was included with the Huygens probe to Titan?<br /><br />Here's the press release from 1997. You could have added your name and a short quote to a database that was burned on to a CD way back when. I had added a short quote, but I haven't heard anything about it since.<br /><br />Here's the link that mentions it:<br />http://www.esa.int/esaCP/Pr_2_1997_p_EN.html<br />

 

[stefsaber]

I remember reading something more recently...in December that the disk was on the Huygens craft...

 

[paulolearysp]

Sure enough. I found some more digging and here's a page mentioning that the CD was mounted on huygens.<br /><br />http://nasanm.nmsu.edu/ERC/scripts/B-detail.asp?CallNumber=C0057<br /><br />I've also found a searchable database of people who wrote in. Found my quote as well, but I didn't spot anyone well known on it.<br /><br />http://television.esa.int/Huygens/index.cfm <br /><br />

 

[tomadams]

this may be off topic a bit, but those rings of saturn are really beautiful.<br /><br />one possible solution to the question of origin is gravitomagnetism. originally saturn might have had a spherical dust cloud of debris and given the astronomical time scale, the orbits precessed to their present location, aligned with the planet's rotation.<br /><br />lageos seemed to provide some indication of precession in the last decade.<br /><br />the beauty of saturn's rings may be evidence of gravitomagnetism. one does not have to run a billion dollar experiment to appreciate beauty. <br /><br />that is my interpretation of the origin of the rings, as a physicist.<br /><br />the rings are the final steady state low energy solution...<br /><br />the gravitomagnetic permeability constant mu just has to exist, dont really have to know its value.<br /><br />thomas cisco adams<br />

 

[telfrow]

<font color="yellow">This is the first raw image returned from the Cassini spacecraft after its closest flyby yet. Here the surface of Enceladus is about 320 kilometers (199 miles) away. The spacecraft completed its flyby on July 14. The remaining raw images will be available later. </font><br /><br />http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/main/index.html <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[aaron38]

The most fascinating thing about that Enceladus image is that I don't see a single crater anywhere! None of the quotes say how large an area that image covers. But for there to not be a single crater, that surface must be incredibly young.<br />

 

[telfrow]

Enceladus encounter raw images are up...<br /><br />http://saturn1.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/raw/raw-images-list.cfm?StartRow=1&cacheQ=1&browseLatest=0&storedQ=1018099 <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[thechemist]

How about this for a closeup ?<br /><br />link <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>I feel better than James Brown.</em> </div>

 

[Leovinus]

The Cassini spacecraft conducted its closest flyby yet, coming within 175 kilometers (109 miles) from the surface of Enceladus. Collected data and raw images are being processed. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[Leovinus]

Now I have to ask you: Isn't this why you came to space.com in the first place?<br /><br /><i>The majesty of Saturn overwhelms in this image from Cassini. Saturn's moon Tethys glides past in its orbit, and the icy rings mask the frigid northern latitudes with their shadows. Tethys is 1,071 kilometers (665 miles) across.<br /><br />The image was taken in visible green light with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on June 10, 2005, at a distance of approximately 1.4 million kilometers (900,000 miles) from Saturn. The image scale is 80 kilometers (50 miles) per pixel. </i> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[astrophoto]

Saturn is so dynamic it doesn't even look 'real'. What a jewel planted in our backyard for us to daydream over.

 

[Leovinus]

I daydreamed over it since I was just a tiny kid and learned of the rings. This was of course back in the 60s. I thought I'd never see the rings in real photographs. When Voyagers passed by, I was delighted. Cassini is icing on the cake. This is why I love space and enjoy my time at space.com. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[telfrow]

<font color="yellow"><b>Tethys' Trojan Telesto</b> <br /><br />This is Cassini's best look yet at the Trojan moon Telesto (24 kilometers, or 15 miles across), which orbits Saturn about 60 degrees ahead of the much larger Tethys (1,071 kilometers, or 665 miles across). Calypso (22 kilometers, or 14 miles across, and not seen here) is the other Tethys Trojan, and trails the larger moon by 60 degrees. Trojan moons are found near gravitationally stable points ahead or behind a larger moon. </font><br /><br /><br /><br />http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=17454<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[Leovinus]

Pretty blurry. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[telfrow]

I thought it was remarkable they could pull that up at 330,000+ miles...<img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> <br /><br /><i>Edit: And it is blurry...that's the reason I didn't post a picture.</i> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[Leovinus]

<i>Believe it or not, this extreme close-up of Saturn's swirling clouds was acquired from more than one million kilometers (621,370 miles) from the gas giant planet. The rings' image is severely bent by atmospheric refraction as they pass behind the planet.<br /><br />The dark region in the rings is the 4,800-kilometer-wide (2,980 mile) Cassini Division.<br /><br />The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on June 25, 2005, at a distance of approximately 1 million kilometers (600,000 miles) from Saturn. The image scale is 6 kilometers (4 miles) per pixel. </i> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[Leovinus]

<i>The great eye of Saturn's moon Mimas (MY-muss), a 130-kilometer-wide (80-mile) impact crater called Herschel, stares out from the battered moon in this raw image taken by the Cassini spacecraft during a flyby on Aug. 2.<br /><br />The Herschel crater is the moon's most prominent feature, and the impact that formed it probably nearly destroyed Mimas. Cassini flew by Mimas at 62,700 kilometers (38,800 miles) above the moon¿s surface, bringing it closer to the little moon than ever before. </i> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[llivinglarge]

"That's no moon..."<br /><br />http://img319.imageshack.us/img319/1741/trap4gx.jpg

 

[telfrow]

Saturn's Auroras<br /><br /><i>The Cassini spacecraft has obtained new images of Saturn's auroral emissions, which are similar to Earth’s Northern Lights. Images taken on June 21, 2005, with Cassini's ultraviolet imaging spectrograph are the first from the mission to capture the entire “oval” of the auroral emissions at Saturn’s south pole. <br /><br />In the side-by-side, false-color images, blue represents aurora emissions from hydrogen gas excited by electron bombardment, while red-orange represents reflected sunlight. The images show that the aurora lights at the polar regions respond rapidly to changes in the solar wind. <br /><br />Previous images have been taken closer to the equator, making it difficult to see the polar regions. Changes in the emissions inside the Saturn south-pole aurora are visible by comparing the two images, taken about one hour apart. The brightest spot in the left aurora fades, and a bright spot appears in the middle of the aurora in the second image. <br /><br />Made by slowly scanning the ultraviolet imaging spectrograph instrument across the planet, the images contain more than 2,000 wavelengths of spectral information within each picture, which helps researchers study Saturn’s auroras, gases, hazes and their changing distributions. <br /><br />Like Earth's aurora, those on Saturn form in an oval at high latitudes around each pole, along with associated spots and streaks. The ultraviolet imaging spectrograph data shows that the Saturn aurora lasts at least one hour, but small changes are visible in that time between the two images. <br /><br />The same process produces auroras on both planets: variations in the plasma environment release trapped electrons, which stream along the magnetic field lines into the upper atmosphere. There, they collide with atoms and molecules, exciting them to higher energies. The atoms and molecules release this added energy by radiating light at particular characteristic colors and wavelengths. On Earth, this light</i> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[tempel1]

Dear friends <br />Go here please:<br />http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press-release-details.cfm?newsID=117 <br />” The spacecraft's VELOCITY RELATIVE TO THE SUN is at about 26 kilometers per second (about 59,250 miles per hour). Cassini is now more than 9 million kilometers (almost 6 million miles) from Earth”. <br /><br />Since our probe is launched from the earth, it has already a velocity of 65,000 miles per hour (earth's velocity). <br /><br />Why have NASA engineers steered Cassini on this trajectory? <br /> http://www.space.com/php/multimedia/imagedisplay/img_display.php?pic=h_cassini_trajectory_02.gif&cap=The <br /><br />Instead of increasing Cassini's velocity they have slowed down it at 59,250 miles per hour. <br /><br />NASA engineers think the earth is the center of our solar system and don't consider earth's velocity. <br /><br />In this wrong way Cassini has travelled for 2 200 000 000 miles to meet Saturn. <br /><br />Cassini would have been able to fly along a straight line travelling for less than 1 000 000 000 miles. <br /><br />65,000 miles per hour (earth velocity) + 36,000 miles per hour (spacecraft's velocity) = 101,000 miles per hour <br /><br />1 000 000 000 miles : 365 days : 24 hours : 101,000 miles per hour = 1.13 years <br /><br />If NASA engineers considered the earth's velocity, Cassini could meet Saturn in one year! <br />

 

[Philotas]

Huygens 3D animation of Titan's surface: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cassini-Huygens/SEMO8G808BE_0.html<br /><br />I wish it were a downloadable quicktime or GIF verson of it.<br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[astrophoto]

No one talking about the Hot Spot on Enceladus yet? Quite interesting ... further drives home the fact that all the assumptions we make every day in astrophysics could all go down the crapper with one simple observation.

 

[yurkin]

There was a big discussion in space science about it back when the report first came out.<br /><br />I think the general consensus was that a large impact caused melting and heating. And that cooling is still taking place.<br />