Strange New Objects Seen In Saturn's Rings 113
Every 15 Earth years, Saturn has its equinox — the time during which its rotational axis is perpendicular to the rays from the sun, so that the sun is always directly "overhead" of Saturn's equator. This is significant because Saturn's rings orbit over the equator, so during the equinox, light from the sun hits them edge-on. This means that any objects wider than the rings, or orbiting above or below them, cast long shadows and are much easier to see. For the first time, we're able to get detailed images of these objects, thanks to Cassini. A moonlet, perhaps 1,300 feet in diameter, has been discovered in the B-ring, and the Bad Astronomy blog points out another object that seems to be bursting through the F-ring. Quoting: "The upward-angled structure is definitely real, as witnessed by the shadow it's casting on the ring material to the lower left. And what's with the bright patch right where this object seems to have slammed into the rings? Did it shatter millions of icy particles, revealing their shinier interior material, making them brighter? Clearly, something awesome and amazing happened here.
Re:That's no moon (Score:3, Insightful)
Saturn is the right planet, stupid movie be damned.
And yes diameter is exactly how you would measure it until you got a high enough resolution image to atually see the shape.
Re:That's no moon (Score:3, Insightful)
In the original novel, the monolith was on a moon of Saturn.
Too bad the movie came first.
Re:radial distance? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Savages (Score:1, Insightful)
Are you crazy? SI-Units should be used under any circumstance.
"Reproducibility of experimental results is central to the scientific method. A standard system of units facilitates this." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Units_of_measurement @ 2009-08-09]
Some scientists or people with great affinity to science (eg.: me) are driven crazy by people using these obsolete units.
Gathering of the nerds... (Score:2, Insightful)
Farscape, 2001, SG-1 and Star Trek all in one article's first few comments. I doubt it's a record for /., but damn. Pity no one could work a Doctor Who reference in there somewhere.
Yeah I'm off-topic, so sue... erm, mod me.
Re:That's no moon (Score:3, Insightful)
Dude, take it back! It's only the best non-porn movie ever!
Well, it would be if it was possible to watch it without falling asleep within less than an hour into the film.