Saturn's Rings To Shine As Never Before |
Saturn's Rings To Shine As Never Before |
Guest_Sunspot_* |
Sep 16 2006, 10:19 AM
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#1
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Guests |
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/features/feature20060915.cfm
Ring scientists have been waiting for this. Finally, after more than two years orbiting Saturn, the Cassini spacecraft reaches one of the ultimate vantage points. The rings should shine with majesty worthy of the "Jewel of the Solar System." |
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Sep 17 2006, 05:25 PM
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#2
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Member Group: Members Posts: 509 Joined: 2-July 05 From: Calgary, Alberta Member No.: 426 |
I am looking forward to this one too.
Another interesting thing about this set of observations is that, given the long exposure times needed to bring out details in the D, G and E rings, we're probably going to see the inner planets in some of the images. Earth, and especially Venus, will be easiest; each should fill up about a fifth of a pixel (in the wide angle camera). As luck would have it, the Moon was almost at its greatest elongation from Earth, as seen from Saturn, on September 15th. Seen through the wide-angle camera, it should be about four pixels away from the Earth, and about four magnitudes fainter. I wonder if it will be visible? Guess it will depend on the amount of smearing due to spacecraft motion (which, now that I think of it, would likely cause the Earth to overwrite the Moon anyways). |
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Sep 17 2006, 07:52 PM
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#3
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Member Group: Members Posts: 706 Joined: 3-December 04 From: Boulder, Colorado, USA Member No.: 117 |
First images are now posted, including some remarkable, though overexposed, images of sunset behind Saturn...
Shouldn't this thread be moved to the Cassini subforum? John. |
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Sep 17 2006, 08:05 PM
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#4
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3648 Joined: 1-October 05 From: Croatia Member No.: 523 |
Amazing how bright the "gap" between the outer edge of A ring and the F ring is here. The F ring is brilliant and the Encke gap is notably dusty as well.
It's a shame a vast sequence of Saturn's limb, multi-filter frames got severly overexposed and suffers from charge bleeding. Hopefully the wide-angles will turn out better. -------------------- |
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