Light Eye
08-15-2005, 09:55 AM
dear friends,
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050815_enceladus.html
be well, be love.
david
puzzling hot spot found on moon of saturn
by ker than
staff writer
posted: 15 august 2005
06:22 am et
in july, nasa's cassini spacecraft made its latest flyby of saturn's moon
enceladus, revealing an unexpected hot spot on the moon's south pole.
the finding flipped everything scientists knew about enceladus on its head,
because what should have been a dead moon appeared to be geologically active and
what was supposed to be the moon's coldest region turned out to be its warmest.
"this is as astonishing as if we'd flown past earth and found that antarctica
was warmer than the sahara," said john spencer, an astronomer from the southwest
research institute in colorado and a co-investigator of the cassini mission.
the finding could explain an old mystery concerning enceladus, but it also
presents a new puzzle of its own.
discovered in 1789 by a british astronomer, enceladus is named after a
mythological greek giant. despite its namesake, it is a tiny moon, only about
300 miles in diameter, and small enough to fit snugly inside the state of
arizona.
the surface of enceladus is coated in a thin layer of ice that reflects back
nearly all of the sunlight striking it, making it the brightest object in the
solar system apart from the sun.
[non-text portions of this message have been removed]
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050815_enceladus.html
be well, be love.
david
puzzling hot spot found on moon of saturn
by ker than
staff writer
posted: 15 august 2005
06:22 am et
in july, nasa's cassini spacecraft made its latest flyby of saturn's moon
enceladus, revealing an unexpected hot spot on the moon's south pole.
the finding flipped everything scientists knew about enceladus on its head,
because what should have been a dead moon appeared to be geologically active and
what was supposed to be the moon's coldest region turned out to be its warmest.
"this is as astonishing as if we'd flown past earth and found that antarctica
was warmer than the sahara," said john spencer, an astronomer from the southwest
research institute in colorado and a co-investigator of the cassini mission.
the finding could explain an old mystery concerning enceladus, but it also
presents a new puzzle of its own.
discovered in 1789 by a british astronomer, enceladus is named after a
mythological greek giant. despite its namesake, it is a tiny moon, only about
300 miles in diameter, and small enough to fit snugly inside the state of
arizona.
the surface of enceladus is coated in a thin layer of ice that reflects back
nearly all of the sunlight striking it, making it the brightest object in the
solar system apart from the sun.
[non-text portions of this message have been removed]