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  

PIA10566: B Ring's Straw-like Clumps
 Target Name:  S Rings
 Is a satellite of:  Saturn
 Mission:  Cassini-Huygens
 Spacecraft:  Cassini Orbiter
 Instrument:  ISS - Narrow Angle
 Product Size:  1016 x 1013 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  Cassini Imaging Team
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA10566.tif (1.03 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA10566.jpg (161.4 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:

Dark straw-like patterns dot the bright outer B ring just left of the Huygens Gap in the center of this image from the Cassini spacecraft.

Cassini scientists speculate that these features are likely the result of transient gravitational clumping.

The outer edge of the B ring is anchored and sculpted by a powerful gravitational resonance with the moon Mimas (396 kilometers, or 246 miles across). The mutual gravity between particles may pull them into clumps as they are periodically forced closely together by the action of Mimas. (see PIA09855 for a closer view).

The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Dec. 8, 2008. This view looks toward the unilluminated side of the rings from about 61 degrees above the ringplane. Cassini captured this view at a distance of approximately 710,000 kilometers (440,000 miles) from Saturn and at a Sun-Saturn-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 65 degrees. Image scale is 4 kilometers (2 miles) per pixel.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/. The Cassini imaging team homepage is at http://ciclops.org.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Image Addition Date:
2009-01-28