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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. Even though Saturn is nearly the size of Jupiter, Saturn has less than one-third of Jupiter's mass. Saturn orbits the Sun at a distance of 9.59 AU (1,434 million km) with an orbital period of 29.45 years.
Titan is the largest moon of Saturn and the second-largest in the Solar System. It is the only moon known to have an atmosphere denser than the Earth's, and is the only known object in space other than Earth on which clear evidence of stable bodies of surface liquid has been found. Titan is one of the seven gravitationally rounded moons of Saturn and the second-most distant among them. Frequently described as a planet-like moon, Titan is 50% larger than Earth's Moon and 80% more massive. It is the second-largest moon in the Solar System after Jupiter's moon Ganymede, and is larger than Mercury, but only 40% as massive due to Mercury being made of mostly dense iron and rock, while a large portion of Titan is made of less-dense ice.
Cassini–Huygens, commonly called Cassini, was a space-research mission by NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Italian Space Agency (ASI) to send a space probe to study the planet Saturn and its system, including its rings and natural satellites. The Flagship-class robotic spacecraft comprised both NASA's Cassini space probe and ESA's Huygens lander, which landed on Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Cassini was the fourth space probe to visit Saturn and the first to enter its orbit, where it stayed from 2004 to 2017. The two craft took their names from the astronomers Giovanni Cassini and Christiaan Huygens.
Huygens was an atmospheric entry robotic space probe that landed successfully on Saturn's moon Titan in 2005. Built and operated by the European Space Agency (ESA), launched by NASA, it was part of the Cassini–Huygens mission and became the first spacecraft to land on Titan and the farthest landing from Earth a spacecraft has ever made. The probe was named after the 17th-century Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens, who discovered Titan in 1655.
This article provides a timeline of the Cassini–Huygens mission. Cassini was a collaboration between the United States' NASA, the European Space Agency ("ESA"), and the Italian Space Agency ("ASI") to send a probe to study the Saturnian system, including the planet, its rings, and its natural satellites. The Flagship-class uncrewed robotic spacecraft comprised both NASA's Cassini probe, and ESA's Huygens lander which was designed to land on Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Cassini was the fourth space probe to visit Saturn and the first to enter its orbit. The craft were named after astronomers Giovanni Cassini and Christiaan Huygens.
Boris Smeds is a Swedish radio engineer and European Space Agency employee, noted for detecting a flaw in Cassini-Huygens space mission.
Jan Charles "John" Zarnecki, is an English space science professor and researcher. Since 2013, Zarnecki has been a Director of the International Space Science Institute. Between 2004 and 2013 he was a Professor of Space Science at the Open University, having previously been a professor and researcher at the University of Kent.
The exploration of Uranus has, to date, been through telescopes and a lone probe by NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft, which made its closest approach to Uranus on January 24, 1986. Voyager 2 discovered 10 moons, studied the planet's cold atmosphere, and examined its ring system, discovering two new rings. It also imaged Uranus' five large moons, revealing that their surfaces are covered with impact craters and canyons.
The exploration of Saturn has been solely performed by crewless probes. Three missions were flybys, which formed an extended foundation of knowledge about the system. The Cassini–Huygens spacecraft, launched in 1997, was in orbit from 2004 to 2017.
Titan Saturn System Mission (TSSM) was a joint NASA–ESA proposal for an exploration of Saturn and its moons Titan and Enceladus, where many complex phenomena were revealed by Cassini. TSSM was proposed to launch in 2020, get gravity assists from Earth and Venus, and arrive at the Saturn system in 2029. The 4-year prime mission would include a two-year Saturn tour, a 2-month Titan aero-sampling phase, and a 20-month Titan orbit phase.
Michele Karen Dougherty is a Professor of Space Physics at Imperial College London. She is leading unmanned exploratory missions to Saturn and Jupiter and is Principal Investigator for J-MAG – a magnetometer for the European Space Agency's Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, launched in April 2023.
The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer is an interplanetary spacecraft on its way to orbit and study three icy moons of Jupiter: Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa. These planetary-mass moons are planned to be studied because they are thought to have beneath their frozen surfaces significant bodies of liquid water, which would make them potentially habitable for extraterrestrial life.
Uranus Pathfinder was a mission concept for the Uranian system evaluated in the 2010s by the European Space Agency. In 2011, scientists from the Mullard Space Science Laboratory in the United Kingdom proposed the joint NASA–ESA Uranus Pathfinder mission to Uranus. It would have been a medium-class (M-class) mission to be launched in 2022, and was submitted to the ESA in December 2010 with the signatures of 120 scientists from around the globe. ESA caps the cost of M-class missions at €470 million. Uranus Pathfinder was proposed in support of ESA's Cosmic Vision 2015–2025. The mission study including several possible combinations of launch dates, trajectories, and flybys, including flybys of Earth, Venus, and of the planet Saturn. Indeed, the study noted the velocity change requirements are only marginally higher than for typical missions to Saturn of this period.
David John Southwood is a British space scientist who holds the post of Senior Research Investigator at Imperial College London. He was the President of the Royal Astronomical Society from 2012–2014, and earlier served as the Director of Science and Robotic Exploration at the European Space Agency (2001–2011). Southwood's research interests have been in solar–terrestrial physics and planetary science, particularly magnetospheres. He built the magnetic field instrument for the Cassini Saturn orbiter.
The Cassini space probe was deliberately disposed of via a controlled fall into Saturn's atmosphere on September 15, 2017, ending its nearly two-decade-long mission. This method was chosen to prevent biological contamination of any of the moons of Saturn now thought to offer potentially habitable environments. Factors that influenced the mission end method included the amount of rocket fuel left, the health of the spacecraft, and funding for operations on Earth.
Bolsena Lacus is one of a number of hydrocarbon lakes found on Saturn's largest moon, Titan.
Feia Lacus is one of a number of hydrocarbon seas and lakes found on Saturn's largest moon, Titan. It was named in 2007 on the basis of data taken by the space probe Cassini.
A flyby is a spaceflight operation in which a spacecraft passes in proximity to another body, usually a target of its space exploration mission and/or a source of a gravity assist to impel it towards another target. Spacecraft which are specifically designed for this purpose are known as flyby spacecraft, although the term has also been used in regard to asteroid flybys of Earth for example. Important parameters are the time and distance of closest approach.
Athena Coustenis is an astrophysicist specializing in planetology. Dr. Coustenis, a French national, is director of research, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, at LESIA, at the Paris Observatory, Meudon. She is involved in several space mission projects for the European Space Agency (ESA) and for NASA. Her focus is on gas giant planets Saturn, Jupiter and their moons, and she is considered a foremost expert on Saturn's moon Titan.
Explorer of Enceladus and Titan (E2T) is a space mission concept that would investigate the evolution and habitability of the Saturnian satellites Enceladus and Titan and is proposed by the European Space Agency in collaboration with NASA.
References
- ↑ "Monsieur Jean-Pierre LEBRETON". National Air and Space Academy. Retrieved 31 May 2017.
- ↑ "Heading for Saturn's mysterious moon: An interview with Jean-Pierre Lebreton". European Space Agency – ESA. 28 August 2002. Retrieved 31 May 2017.
