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A ring system is a disc or ring, orbiting an astronomical object, that is composed of solid material such as dust and moonlets, and is a common component of satellite systems around giant planets like Saturn. A ring system around a planet is also known as a planetary ring system.
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine-and-a-half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth, but is over 95 times more massive.
Rhea is the second-largest moon of Saturn and the ninth-largest moon in the Solar System, with a surface area that is comparable to the area of Australia. It is the smallest body in the Solar System for which precise measurements have confirmed a shape consistent with hydrostatic equilibrium. It was discovered in 1672 by Giovanni Domenico Cassini.
Tethys, or Saturn III, is a mid-sized moon of Saturn about 1,060 km (660 mi) across. It was discovered by G. D. Cassini in 1684 and is named after the titan Tethys of Greek mythology.
Janus is an inner satellite of Saturn. It is also known as Saturn X. It is named after the mythological Janus.
Epimetheus is an inner satellite of Saturn. It is also known as Saturn XI. It is named after the mythological Epimetheus, brother of Prometheus.
Pandora is an inner satellite of Saturn. It was discovered in 1980 from photos taken by the Voyager 1 probe, and was provisionally designated S/1980 S 26. In late 1985 it was officially named after Pandora from Greek mythology. It is also designated Saturn XVII.
Hyperion, also known as Saturn VII, is a moon of Saturn discovered by William Cranch Bond, his son George Phillips Bond and William Lassell in 1848. It is distinguished by its irregular shape, its chaotic rotation, and its unexplained sponge-like appearance. It was the first non-round moon to be discovered.
Himalia, or Jupiter VI, is the largest irregular satellite of Jupiter, with a diameter of at least 140 km (90 mi). It is the sixth largest Jovian satellite, after the four Galilean moons and Amalthea. It was discovered by Charles Dillon Perrine at the Lick Observatory on 3 December 1904 and is named after the nymph Himalia, who bore three sons of Zeus. It is one of the largest planetary moons in the Solar System not imaged in detail, and the third largest not imaged in detail within the orbit of Neptune.
The moons of Saturn are numerous and diverse, ranging from tiny moonlets only tens of meters across to the enormous Titan, which is larger than the planet Mercury. There are 146 moons with confirmed orbits, the most of any planet in the solar system. This number does not include the many thousands of moonlets embedded within Saturn's dense rings, nor hundreds of possible kilometer-sized distant moons that were seen through telescopes but not recaptured. Seven Saturnian moons are large enough to have collapsed into a relaxed, ellipsoidal shape, though only one or two of those, Titan and possibly Rhea, are currently in hydrostatic equilibrium. Three moons are particularly notable. Titan is the second-largest moon in the Solar System, with a nitrogen-rich Earth-like atmosphere and a landscape featuring river networks and hydrocarbon lakes. Enceladus emits jets of ice from its south-polar region and is covered in a deep layer of snow. Iapetus has contrasting black and white hemispheres as well as an extensive ridge of equatorial mountains among the tallest in the solar system.
Skathi, also named Saturn XXVII and originally spelled Skadi, is a natural satellite of the planet Saturn. Skathi is one of Saturn's irregular moons, in its Norse group of satellites. It was discovered on September 23, 2000, by a team of astronomers led by Brett Gladman. The team announced their discovery on December 7, 2000, along with seven other satellites of Saturn, namely; Tarvos, Ijiraq, Thrymr, Siarnaq, Mundilfari, Erriapus, and Suttungr. The moon was named after Skaði, a figure in Norse mythology, as part of an effort to diversify the largely Greek and Roman names of astronomical objects.
In astronomy, the rotation period or spin period of a celestial object has two definitions. The first one corresponds to the sidereal rotation period, i.e., the time that the object takes to complete a full rotation around its axis relative to the background stars. The other type of commonly used "rotation period" is the object's synodic rotation period, which may differ, by a fraction of a rotation or more than one rotation, to accommodate the portion of the object's orbital period around a star or another body during one day.
The rings of Saturn are the most extensive ring system of any planet in the Solar System. They consist of countless small particles, ranging in size from micrometers to meters, that orbit around Saturn. The ring particles are made almost entirely of water ice, with a trace component of rocky material. There is still no consensus as to their mechanism of formation. Although theoretical models indicated that the rings were likely to have formed early in the Solar System's history, newer data from Cassini suggested they formed relatively late.
Carolyn C. Porco is an American planetary scientist who explores the outer Solar System, beginning with her imaging work on the Voyager missions to Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune in the 1980s. She led the imaging science team on the Cassini mission in orbit around Saturn. She is an expert on planetary rings and the Saturnian moon, Enceladus.
Rosaly M. C. Lopes is a planetary geologist, volcanologist, an author of numerous scientific papers and several books, as well as a proponent of education. Her major research interests are in planetary and terrestrial surface processes with an emphasis on volcanology.
Scott Duncan Tremaine is a Canadian-born astrophysicist. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of London, the Royal Society of Canada and the National Academy of Sciences. Tremaine is widely regarded as one of the world's leading astrophysicists for his contributions to the theory of Solar System and galactic dynamics. Tremaine is the namesake of asteroid 3806 Tremaine. He is credited with coining the name "Kuiper belt".
Philip D. Nicholson is an Australian-born professor of astronomy at Cornell University in the Astronomy department specialising in Planetary Sciences. He was editor-in-chief of the journal Icarus between 1998 and 2018.
Planetary science is the scientific study of planets, celestial bodies and planetary systems and the processes of their formation. It studies objects ranging in size from micrometeoroids to gas giants, aiming to determine their composition, dynamics, formation, interrelations and history. It is a strongly interdisciplinary field, which originally grew from astronomy and Earth science, and now incorporates many disciplines, including planetary geology, cosmochemistry, atmospheric science, physics, oceanography, hydrology, theoretical planetary science, glaciology, and exoplanetology. Allied disciplines include space physics, when concerned with the effects of the Sun on the bodies of the Solar System, and astrobiology.
Mark Robert Showalter is a senior research scientist at the SETI Institute. He is the discoverer of six moons and three planetary rings. He is the Principal Investigator of NASA's Planetary Data System Rings Node, a co-investigator on the Cassini–Huygens mission to Saturn, and works closely with the New Horizons mission to Pluto.
Linda Spilker is an American planetary scientist who served as the project scientist for the Cassini mission exploring the planet Saturn. Her research interests include the evolution and dynamics of Saturn's rings.
References
- 1 2 Solar System Dynamics by Carl D. Murray & Stanley F. Dermott, Cambridge University Press, February 2000, ISBN 0521575974
- ↑ Carl D. Murray at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- 1 2 Insider's Cassini: Dr. Carl Murray and the F Ring by Todd J. Barber, NASA, July 21, 2010
- ↑ The mission of a lifetime: Professor Carl Murray and Cassini, 27 years later Queen Mary University of London, 2017
- ↑ Meet Frank, Saturn's 60th moon ABC Science, 23 July 2007
- ↑ Saturn’s 60th The European Space Agency, July 20, 2007
- ↑ 198 results for Carl D. Murray ScienceDirect
- ↑ Carl D. Murray Astronomy Unit, School of Physical and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London
