Cassini-Huygens is a robotically designed spacecraft, currently studying the planet Saturn and its natural moons. A spacecraft is an artificial space object used to investigate Earth and outer space. Cassini probe was named after the Italian-French astronomer Giovanni Domenico Cassini (1625-1712), who discovered the Cassini division, which is the gap between the rings of Saturn. The little lander Huygens was named after the astronomer, physicist and mathematician Christian Huygens (1629 - 1695), who in 1656 realized that, what Galileo thought to be satellites of Saturn, are actually a system of rings. Cassini-Huygens spacecraft was launched in October 1997. In July 2004 …show more content…
she maneuvered IOS (Saturn Orbit Insertion) thus entering the Saturn’s orbit. The probe found many interesting information about the planet, especially about its satellites: After flying around Titan, the probe has captured radar images depicting lakes, islands and mountains.
After two full flights around Titan, Huygens space probe detached and fell on the surface of sending to Earth data collected during the descent into the atmosphere after landing. In 2006, Cassini has provided evidence indicating hydrocarbon lakes, the lakes’ largest size being the same as Caspian Sea.
Also in 2006, NASA announced that the Cassini probe found evidence indicating the presence of liquid water reservoirs that erupt in the form of geysers on Enceladus. Images show jets of ice particles emitted from Enceladus's south polar region is projected directly into orbit around Saturn. In 2011, scientists at NASA claimed that Enceladus has a proper environment for maintaining …show more content…
life. In October 2006, the probe detected a cyclonic storm with a diameter of 8,000 kilometers and a central eye visible at the north pole of Saturn. From 2004 to 2009 it was discovered and confirmed November 8 new moons. In my opinion, Saturn is a planet worth studying because of its rings and satellites due to the fact that they are the most spectacular particularities of its own.
Ring A is located in the outer.
Ring B have dark spokes, which is due to the fact that matter is not distributed evenly. Ring C is in made of many individual strips and is the least luminous ring of Saturn visible from Earth. Space probes have discovered four groups of rings (D-G). Ring D is located inside, stretching almost to the atmosphere of Saturn. Ring E is composed of very fine particles being less luminous than others. Also, it is the largest of Saturn's ring. Due to mutual attraction of satellites Prometheus and Pandora, parts of the F ring appear to be woven. Also, there is the G ring which is very small. The rings of Saturn are composed of particles of rock and ice. Despite their stretch, their mass is low, representing only 1/25000 of the planet's mass. Through Voyajer probe, it was found that the Cassini division is not completely empty, as the astronomer Giovanni Cassini has claimed in the year 1675. In this gap with a width of about 4,800 km were found in total about 1,000 thin individual rings. Cassini-Huygens spacecraft has documented about the formation of a frozen body inside the rings of Saturn and NASA researchers argue that we could witness the formation of a new moon. It was nicknamed the moment "Peggy" and has a diameter estimated at about 1 km, but sizes can increase significantly as the object's gravity will attract rocks, dust and ice from the
ring.
Photos taken by the probe on April 15, 2013 showed some anomalies on the edge of Saturn's A ring. One of these anomalies was an arc of approximately 20% lighter than anything else around, 1.2 km long and 10 km wide. Also unusual protrusions were observed at the edge of the ring, usually very homogeneous. NASA experts believe that the protrusion is caused by the gravitational pull exerted by an ice object, probably a small sized moon that is about to break away from the ring. Although the subject might disintegrate, its formation and its trajectory provides important clues on how the 62 moons of Saturn could have formed. NASA experts believe that Saturn's rings, which are made of ice, rock and dust acts as a nursery for the formation of moons. As the ring components come together, under gravity.