New Ring Around Saturn

The Fun Guy writes "From the New York Times: 'In its first month orbiting Saturn, the Cassini spacecraft has detected a new radiation belt in an unexpected place, its invisible swarm of trapped high-energy particles circling the planet inside the inner edge of Saturn's signature disk of luminous rings.' Cassini has also seen 'a striking glow emanating day and night from the planet's largest moon, Titan.' A moon that shines with unborrowed light!"

We know nothing

[numLocked]

I think this is one of the most exciting missions NASA has done in a quite some time. Articles like this really remind us that we have no idea what's going on and that there's a whole lot out there we haven't seen. Exploration is something else. I think what NASA really needs is some better marketing so people who aren't paying attention to these types of missions are drawn in. People love exploration - they just don't realize it's going on.

Re:Not a ring

[MarsDefenseMinister]

It matters because a lot of people are not knowlegable about astronomy, but have a lot of curiosity. They rely on little articles they read here and there for their information, including headlines they read on Slashdot. Misinformation doesn't do anyone any good.

It also matters because astronomy is to a large extent funded by public money. The people paying the bills for mega telescopes and space missions deserve to know the truth about the discoveries that they pay for.

Re:Not a ring

[DustMagnet]

It is entirely conceivable that ring can be used as a synonym for belt, particularly in this instance. Sure, radiation belts are typically called "belts" but there's no reason why they can't be called "rings".

There's a very good reason one is call rings and one is called belts. Look at the picture [nytimes.com]. Sure it's possible to have a radiation ring and a rock/ice belt, but that doesn't change the fact that a radiation belt was found.