Never-before-seen looming vertical structures, created by the tiny moon Daphnis, cast long shadows across the rings in this startling image taken as Saturn approaches its mid-August 2009 equinox.
Credit: CICLOPS/Cassini/NASA
However, the new analysis also illustrates that when such a moon has an orbit inclined to the ring plane, as does Daphnis, the waves can be much bigger vertically.
This result is backed by spectacular new images taken recently near equinox showing the shadows of the vertical waves created by Daphnis, and cast onto the nearby ring, that match the predictions made by the scientists.
Their calculations estimated, from the lengths of the shadows, that these wave can be as 1.5 km in height, twice as high as previously thought, and as much as 150 times as high as the rings are thick. The main rings – named A, B and C – are only about 10 m thick.
One of the prime future goals of the imaging team is to scour the remaining gaps and divisions within the rings to search for the moons expected to be there.
"It is one of those questions that have been nagging us since getting into orbit: 'Why haven't we yet seen a moon in every gap?'" said co-author Carolyn Porco, leader of the Cassini imaging team. "We now think they may actually be there, only a lot smaller than we expected."
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With the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
