Thursday, November 13, 2008

Saturn's mysteries


Cassini continues to reveal more and more about Saturn. Saturn has an aurora in the polar region, as you can see. It is unique, even for a planet with an aurora. Earth and Jupiter auroras are a ring of auroras. Saturn's covers a large area across the pole. An aurora is caused by charged particles which travel along the lines of the magnetic field of planet into the atmosphere.
Earth's aurora is caused by particles from the sun becoming trapped by the magnetic field. Jupiter's aurora are caused by non-solar particles and is constant in size. Saturn's main aurora changes size dramatically as the solar wind varies, driving the particle flow into the planet's mag field. Since the aurora and its behavior are so unexpected, explanations are non-existent at present.
Learn more and see more pictures at http://www.nasa.gov/cassini

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