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What NASA Found Beyond The Rings Of Saturn (omaha.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the probing-the-planets dept.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft explored the inner edge of the rings of Saturn for the first time, and Phys.org reports that it made a surprising discovery: nothing. "Scientists have been surprised to find that not all that much -- not even space dust -- lies between Saturn's iconic rings." After the first pass, the NASA official managing the project described the the region between the rings and Saturn as "the big empty." An anonymous reader quotes the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Cassini also beamed back pictures and other essential data as it maneuvered the 1,500-mile-wide space between the solar system's second largest planet and its icy rings. The images, which take 78 minutes to make the billion-mile trip back to Earth, reveal a blazing, mysterious process of alternating light and darkness in the rings that scientists will be working for years to understand. That seems only fair since it has already taken 20 years for Cassini to be in a position to do what it is doing so far.

Between now and September, Cassini will make 22 dives between Saturn's rings and the planet, clocking at an impressive 76,800 mph each time. The end result should be a treasure trove of stunning images of the planet and its diverse and mysterious rings, along with detailed maps of the gas giant's gravity, magnetic fields and atmospheric conditions. On Sept. 15, it will plunge into Saturn's atmosphere, streaming data back to Earth as it makes its descent of no return.

48 comments

  1. Re:American Prisons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They are not even minimally ethical. This is obvious to everyone. Ethics was clearly never one of the considerations, it was always blatantly and openly about money.

    Can you explain what this has to do with Jupiter, its' rings, or the Cassini spacecraft?

  2. If we ever colonize. .. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    At least we know that we have a safe place for several SNSS ( Saturnian Navigational Satellite Systems) to coexist...

  3. What NASA found beyong the rings of Saturn? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Probably the Rings of Uranus.

    1. Re: What NASA found beyong the rings of Saturn? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What would be the benefit of sending a probe up Uranus. Tell me

  4. Seems obvious. by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

    Beyond the rings of Saturn was... Saturn! ;)

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    1. Re:Seems obvious. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But what's beyond Saturn?

      The rings again!

    2. Re: Seems obvious. by Frankzy · · Score: 1

      This is getting out of hand!

  5. Thought that was the whole point. by bosef1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I thought the current theory was that most of the gaps in Saturn's rings are caused by gravitational resonances with other orbiting bodies; these resonances having cleared the resonance orbits in question. I haven't RTFA yet, but is the point that actually finding nothing validates the model, or is there too much nothing, or what?

    1. Re:Thought that was the whole point. by AK+Marc · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The dust wouldn't have been as well cleared, and the same bodies that cleared them, would have pushed bits in the dense areas into collisions, resulting in more dust. And no, there's nothign in TFA about the "why", they haven't even gotten back all the "what" yet. I expect that one of the results will include a revised estimate to the age.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    2. Re:Thought that was the whole point. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Apparently whoever wrote TFS was unaware of gaps withing the rings.

      not even space dust -- lies between Saturn's iconic rings.

      should read ... between Saturn's rings and the fucking planet. Why scientists expected more dust in that region still remains a mystery.

    3. Re:Thought that was the whole point. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why scientists expected more dust in that region still remains a mystery.

      Indeed, it seems obvious that there should be a void there. You don't expect to find dust between the rings and Saturn, because any dust that does get into that space quickly falls back down to Saturn. The rings end at the point where dust can remain in orbit given the gravitational pull of Saturn.

    4. Re:Thought that was the whole point. by mbone · · Score: 2

      I thought the current theory was that most of the gaps in Saturn's rings are caused by gravitational resonances with other orbiting bodies; these resonances having cleared the resonance orbits in question. I haven't RTFA yet, but is the point that actually finding nothing validates the model, or is there too much nothing, or what?

      Yes, the gaps are cleared by resonances with the moons, and this finding does not change that at all. Cassini was going beneath the rings, between the D ring and the upper atmosphere of Saturn, and the general feeling was that there would be a constant stream of ring material ("dust," although really it would be small ice particles) going down from the rings to burn up in Saturn's atmosphere. Now, it seems that isn't so, and I am sure some theorists are working on papers to explain why even as we discuss it here.

  6. So that's where the money goes. by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

    Between now and September, Cassini will make 22 dives between Saturn's rings and the planet, clocking at an impressive 76,800 mph each time

    It seems pretty clear that they opted for the Tesla "insane mode" upgrade. Damn those cars are fast. ;)

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    1. Re:So that's where the money goes. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      cool ad bro.

  7. Re:American Prisons by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

    Private enterprise is cheaper than big government. Government is bad, so private is better. Why should the budget be wasted on the government doing things at cost, when it can be used to extract funds from people and pay them to billionaires making huge profits?

    --
    Learn to love Alaska
  8. Re:American Prisons by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

    Can you explain what this has to do with Jupiter, its' rings, or the Cassini spacecraft?

    Penal colonies. Duh.

    --
    Learn to love Alaska
  9. Space vacuum by JonnyCalcutta · · Score: 2

    I guess all the space dust has been sucked up by the space vacuum and put in the space bin.

  10. Re:American Prisons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The same way making food is for profit.
    If someone doesn't make a profit, I starve.
    How is that ethical?

  11. Re:American Prisons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Can you explain what this has to do with Jupiter, its' rings, or the Cassini spacecraft?"

    Can you explain the purpose of the apostrophe after the letter s in the possessive pronoun "its"? Most retards who can't spell usually put an apostrophe before every letter s they type, but putting it after the s is a new level of retardation.

    it's means it is. its means belongs to.

    That's it. Simple as that.

  12. Beyond or inside? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Headline says Beyond, article says Inside.
    Words matter folks.

    1. Re:Beyond or inside? by mbone · · Score: 1

      Beneath. Between the lowest ring and the upper atmosphere of Saturn.

  13. Collissions by phantomfive · · Score: 1

    What are the chances that Cassini will collide with some asteroid or rock orbiting Saturn before ending its mission?

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:Collissions by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      What are the chances that Cassini will collide with some asteroid or rock orbiting Saturn before ending its mission?

      Then we'll know what cleared that orbit.

    2. Re:Collissions by mbone · · Score: 3, Informative

      They were very worried about dust and ice fragments between the rings and Saturn itself before they went inside the rings*, which is why they used the Cassini radio antenna as a shield during the first two ring plane passages. Now that they have found that there is not much dust there, they won't have to do that**, which will free the spacecraft to take better pictures and collect better data.

      As for the rest, Cassini entered orbit around Saturn on July 1, 2004. If it hasn't been struck so far, it will probably be OK for the rest of the mission.

      * There was talk about doing this with Pioneer 11 in 1979, but in the end it was viewed as too dangerous.
      ** There will be 4 passes near the D ring for which the antenna will be used as a shield again.

    3. Re:Collissions by Hognoxious · · Score: 0

      I'm not saying it's aliens...

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  14. On October 5th, you all die by Suiggy · · Score: 0

    When the plutonium RTGs go critical deep in Saturn's atmosphere due to the pressures, the explosion will cause a chain reaction, igniting all of Saturn as a second Sun in a process that will last decades. Lucifer shall be born and the sacrifices shall begin as the world is plunged into chaos and anarchy. Enjoy the next few months, they may be your last.

    1. Re:On October 5th, you all die by behrooz0az · · Score: 1

      Sorry for not bursting your bubble.
      Saturn is too cold for even hendreds of nukes to be able to create a chain reaction with the gas in the atmosphere.

      --
      Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion. -- Spazmania (174582)
    2. Re:On October 5th, you all die by behrooz0az · · Score: 1

      s/hendreds/hundreds/

      --
      Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion. -- Spazmania (174582)
    3. Re: On October 5th, you all die by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lightnings in Saturn atmosphere are already stronger than any plutonium explosion

    4. Re:On October 5th, you all die by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      You need 180 Saturn masses to ignite a star. You forgot about the monoliths.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    5. Re:On October 5th, you all die by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What's a hendred?
      Foxes in the Chicken Coop.

      By the way, Billions of Nukes wouldn't do it either. It's not that Saturn is too Cold; that would actually help things. There just isn't enough Deuterium, even less than that of Jupiter, present in the atmosphere. Jupiter itself would have to be some 100 times more massive than it is just to get to the Brown Dwarf stage, and it would have to be very young a long time ago so that heating due to Gravitational Compression could get hot enough fast enough. One estimate is that a Jupiter some 100 times times the Mass would need to contract to a millionth of its size in the order of milliseconds in order to Ignite, and even then, there still isn't enough Deuterium; a bit more Lithium might help.
      One of the interesting things about the Isotopic Analysis of such Gas Giants is that they must be very common. Four of the nine Solar Planets... OK... eight Solar Planets are Gas Giants that are depleted in the very things that make them candidates for early Stardom. Earth Hydrogen is enriched in Deuterium up to ten times that of Jupiter, (It actually does vary quite a lot comparatively.), which leads to the interesting hypothesis that the Primordial bits that came together to form Earth are _older_ than those that came together more recently to form Jupiter. Earth is the result of unknown numbers of early Novas and Supernovas, while Jupiter just sits there continually sucking up Interstellar leftovers from the Big Bang.
      But this is all quite tentative. We have _no_ idea what the H/D Ratios are at Jupiter's Core, which is supposedly made of Metallic Hydrogen. One possible way of determining this is by using Jupiter as a Gravitational Lens, and as it passes in front of known Extrasolar Neutrino Sources, checking their attenuation and deflection.
      This would involve building a very big and very expensive Neutrino Detector, which is unlikely to be funded any time in the next Millennium.

    6. Re: On October 5th, you all die by mbone · · Score: 1

      Lightnings in Saturn atmosphere are already stronger than any plutonium explosion

      Not to mention that the Plutonium-238 used in RTGs is not fissile and produces only alpha particles, and thus can never go critical.

  15. NOT Beyond. NOT Between. Beneath by mbone · · Score: 4, Informative

    Cassini did not find any material beneath the rings of Saturn - that is, between the lowest ring, the D ring, and the atmosphere of Saturn. I don't know why headline writers have been getting this so consistently wrong.

    1. Re:NOT Beyond. NOT Between. Beneath by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because while you're technically correct, you would be poorly communicating the fact, as most people would imagine "below" to be below from an outside observer, not below in relation to the planet.

  16. So, if there's nothing there... by edxwelch · · Score: 1

    Does that mean that they no longer need to use the main antenna as a shield when it's going through the gap?

    1. Re:So, if there's nothing there... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Mind the Keeler gap...

    2. Re:So, if there's nothing there... by mbone · · Score: 1

      Does that mean that they no longer need to use the main antenna as a shield when it's going through the gap?

      That is exactly what this means, and that will mean better pictures and data from the ring plane passages.

  17. Let me guess by pezezin · · Score: 1

    No wormhole? I'm dissapointed.

  18. Pay no attention, Intelligent Beings... by pepsikid · · Score: 1

    Absolutely nothing happened in Sector 83 by 9 by 12 today. I repeat, nothing happened in Sector 83 by 9 by 12.

  19. Re: American Prisons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    profit can take many different forms. Dollar slaves wouldn't know the difference

  20. Uranus? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thats what I was taught in school, anyway.

  21. Re:American Prisons by modmans2ndcoming · · Score: 1

    exactly!!

  22. Re: American Prisons by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

    ...teasing Down's people

    Oh, the sweet irony.

  23. Re: American Prisons by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    Oh, the sweet irony.

    Yes, but not where you thought it was.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  24. Slight tangent... by ausekilis · · Score: 1

    It's interesting to me how we can have people devote their lives to a cause - Animal Rights, Gender Rights, Pollution Cleanup, whatever... Then we have folks whose careers focus on one major project (e.g. the B-52 that has been in service for 70 years, or the ALCM that has been around for 30... to say nothing of design and development for either). And here we have people who devote a few years planning and building, then may never get to see the results. I'd imagine something as big as a probe to do X would have more than it's fair share of greybeards on board to figure out trajectories, contingencies, etc... 20 years is more than enough time for someone who was 40 at the start to be in or considering retirement.

    The fact that it took 20 years to get Cassini into position is itself amazing. We are talking using technology from 2 decades ago. That's the difference between the N64 and the Switch, (or ps1 and ps4). That's Pentium 2 (almost 3) era technology, CPU's were roughly 600 MHz. Now we have quad-core 1.2 GHz in our pockets.

    Oh, and get off my lawn.