Saturn - 1

Gaseous Saturn is the second largest planet in the solar system, behind Jupiter. Despite their imposing appearance, the glorious rings around Saturn are only about 10m thick! The rings consist of billions of individual particles of mostly water ice. Interactions with the gravitational field of Saturn’s moons create waves, wakes, and other structures. Tiny moons orbit within gaps in the rings, keeping the gaps open. Scientists still are not sure exactly how old the rings are nor how they were formed. But it is clear that the rings we observe today were not all created in the same way. NASA’s Cassini mission discovered that a great plume of icy material emanating from Saturn’s moon Enceladus is a major source of material for the expansive E ring. Cassini has also discovered new ringlets, a moon that is stealing particles from the narrow F ring, and features within the rings shaped like straw and rope.