CaltechAUTHORS
Published April 26, 1996 | Version public
Journal Article Metadata-only

Observations of Saturn's Ring-Plane Crossings in August and November 1995

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon Cornell University
  • 2. ROR icon Stanford University
  • 3. ROR icon Wellesley College
  • 4. ROR icon University of Arizona
  • 5. ROR icon Stony Brook University
  • 6. ROR icon University of Michigan–Ann Arbor
  • 7. ROR icon California Institute of Technology

Abstract

Observations of Saturn's ring system with the Hubble Space Telescope during the 10 August 1995 Earth crossing and the 17 to 21 November 1995 solar crossing indicate that the F ring dominates their apparent edge-on thickness of 1.2 to 1.5 kilometers. The F ring is slightly inclined with respect to the A ring, which may explain the approximately 50-minute difference in apparent crossing times for the east and west ring ansae in August. Prometheus lags its predicted position by about 19 degrees in longitude. The faint G ring is neutral or reddish in color and is confined to a radial range of 2.72 to 2.85 Saturn radii. The broad, distinctly blue E ring flares outward to a maximum thickness of about 15,000 kilometers at 7.5 Saturn radii and appears to have a spatially uniform particle size distribution.

Additional Information

© 1996 American Association for the Advancement of Science. Received 4 March 1996; accepted 1 April 1996. We appreciate discussions with A. Bosh, C. Murray, J. Cuzzi, and R. Jacobson. The Laplace plane calculations were done by G. Black. The HST scheduling was handled by A. Lubenow and A. Storrs. We used the support tools provided by the Planetary Data System's Rings Node both in planning image sequences and in analyzing the satellite observations taken with the NASNESA HST, obtained by STScI, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy under NASA contract NAS5-26555. Further support was provided by NASA grants NAGW-544, NAGW-1368, NAGW- 247, and RTOPS 151-01-60-12 and 151-01-60-09. P.D.N. acknowledges the hospitality of Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ, where much of this paper was written, and Queen Mary and Westfield College, London.

Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
52847
DOI
10.1126/science.272.5261.509
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20141216-085837992

Related works

Describes
10.1126/science.272.5261.509 (DOI)
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2890093 (URL)

Funding

NASA
NAS5-26555
NASA
NAGW-544
NASA
NAGW-1368
NASA
NAGW-247
NASA
RTOP 151-01-60-12
NASA
RTOP 151-01-60-09

Dates

Created
2014-12-16
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-10
Created from EPrint's last_modified field