PDS logoPlanetary Data System
PDS Information
Find a Node - Use these links to navigate to any of the 8 publicly accessible PDS Nodes.

This bar indicates that you are within the PDS enterprise which includes 6 science discipline nodes and 2 support nodes which are overseen by the Project Management Office at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC). Each node is led by an expert in the subject discipline, supported by an advisory group of other practitioners of that discipline, and subject to selection and approval under a regular NASA Research Announcement.
Click here to return to the Photojournal Home Page Click here to view a list of Photojournal Image Galleries Photojournal_inner_header
Latest Images  |  Spacecraft & Technology  |  Animations  |  Space Images App  |  Feedback  |  Photojournal Search  

PIA02274: Saturn's B-ring
 Target Name:  S Rings
 Is a satellite of:  Saturn
 Mission:  Voyager
 Spacecraft:  Voyager 2
 Instrument:  VG ISS - Narrow Angle
 Product Size:  408 x 539 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  JPL
 Producer ID:  P23881
 Addition Date:  2000-05-23
 Primary Data Set:  Voyager EDRs
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA02274.tif (47.96 kB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA02274.jpg (15.24 kB)

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

Prominent dark spokes are visible in the outer half of Saturn's broad B-ring in this Voyager 2 photograph taken on Aug. 3, 1981 from a range of about 22 million kilometers (14 million miles). The features appear as filamentary markings about 12,000 kilometers (7,S00 miles) long, which rotate around the planet with the motion of particles in the rings. The nature of these features, discovered by Voyager 1, is not totally understood, but scientists believe the spokes may be caused by dust levitated above the ring plane by electric fields; Voyager 2 photography of the rings edge-on, scheduled for Aug. 25, 1981, will provide an opportunity to test that theory. Because the Sun is now illuminating the rings from a higher angle, Voyager 2's photographs reveal ring structure from a greater distance than that seen by Voyager 1 in its November 1980 encounter. The Voyager project is managed for NASA by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL

Image Addition Date:
2000-05-23