Tag Archives: rings

Those two dots visible between Saturn’s rings? That’s the Earth and the Moon. To wit:

Just over three years ago, because the Sun was temporarily blocked by the body of Saturn, the robotic Cassini spacecraft was able to look toward the inner Solar System. There, it spotted our Earth and Moon — just pin-pricks of light lying about 1.4 billion kilometers distant. Toward the right of the featured image is Saturn’s A ring, with the broad Encke Gap on the far right and the narrower Keeler Gap toward the center. On the far left is Saturn’s continually changing F Ring. From this perspective, the light seen from Saturn’s rings was scattered mostly forward , and so appeared backlit. After more than a decade of exploration and discovery, the Cassini spacecraft ran low on fuel in 2017 and was directed to enter Saturn’s atmosphere, where it surely melted.

(Image: NASA, ESA, JPL-Caltech, SSI, Cassini Imaging Team; Processing & License: Kevin M. Gill)

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Behold: an only slightly exaggerated view of what one would see if hovering close to the ringed gas giant. To wit:

The image was taken in 2005 by the robot Cassini spacecraft that orbited Saturn from 2004 to 2017. Here Saturn’s majestic rings appear directly only as a curved line, appearing brown, in part, from its infrared glow. The rings best show their complex structure in the dark shadows they create across the upper part of the planet. The northern hemisphere of Saturn can appear partly blue for the same reason that Earth’s skies can appear blue — molecules in the cloudless portions of both planet’s atmospheres are better at scattering blue light than red. When looking deep into Saturn’s clouds, however, the natural gold hue of Saturn’s clouds becomes dominant. It is not known why southern Saturn does not show the same blue hue — one hypothesis holds that clouds are higher there. It is also not known why some of Saturn’s clouds are coloured gold.

(Image: NASA, ESA, JPL, ISS, Cassini Imaging Team; Processing & License: Judy Schmidt)

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Images of the rings of Saturn pix 1,2: (outer (B) ring, pix 1,2; inner (A) ring, pic 3 and a detail of a density wave, pic 4) taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, now in the midst of its ‘ring grazing’ phase as it moves in to study the outer and inner disks of orbiting ice and rock.

These images are twice the resolution of anything previously achievable and allow objects as small as 550m (about the height of the CN Tower in Toronto) to be discerned.

Full resolution photos here.

Previously: The Seas Of Titan

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Real human teeth set in silver by Australian silversmith Polly van der Glas, who also works with human hair.

Human teeth are locally donated and sterilised, and human hair is either locally donated or sourced from India and China. Teeth are particularly difficult to come by, so any donations are gratefully accepted.

The ring with the four teeth pictured above will set you back $1,000 AUD from Polly’s store, but if you can provide the teeth you’ll get a 10% discount. The pavement outside pubs around closing time is always a good place to look.

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