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Astronomy Picture of the Day
4,000 Kilometers Above Saturn's Iapetus
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#103371
by
[z]Barbara Harris
@
20.09.2007 00:00
- nach oben -
4,000 Kilometers Above Saturn's Iapetus
Explanation: What does the surface of Saturn's mysterious moon Iapetus look like? To help find out, the robotic
Cassini spacecraft
now orbiting
Saturn
was sent soaring last week just 2,000 kilometers from the unique equatorial ridge of the unusual
walnut-shaped
two-toned moon
. The
above image
from Cassini is from about 4,000 kilometers out and allows objects under 100-meters across to be resolved. Cassini found an
ancient and battered landscape
of craters, sloping hills, and mountains as high as 10 kilometers and so
rival
the 8.8-kilometer height of
Mt. Everest
on Earth. Just above the center of
this image
is a small bright patch where an impacting rock might have uncovered deep clean water ice.
Space scientists
will be studying flyby images like this for clues to the origin of
Iapetus' unusual shape
and
coloring
with particular emphasis because
no more close flybys
of the enigmatic world are planned.
APOD editor to review best space pictures in Philadelphia next Wednesday
Credit & Copyright