1. cosmosscience: The hexagon of Saturn Saturn may be most famous for its spectacular rings, but Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune have rings too. However, nothing like the giant hexagon circling Saturn’s north pole has ever been seen on any other planet, with each of its sides nearly 7,500 miles (12,500 kilometers) across — big enough to fit nearly four Earths inside. Thermal images show it reaches some 60 miles (100 kilometers) down into the planet’s atmosphere. Scientists have bandied about several other ideas concerning the hexagon’s origin. One such idea is that the hexagon arises from a complex interaction between waves undulating through the atmosphere and gas churning up. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

    cosmosscience:

    The hexagon of Saturn

    Saturn may be most famous for its spectacular rings, but Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune have rings too. However, nothing like the giant hexagon circling Saturn’s north pole has ever been seen on any other planet, with each of its sides nearly 7,500 miles (12,500 kilometers) across — big enough to fit nearly four Earths inside. Thermal images show it reaches some 60 miles (100 kilometers) down into the planet’s atmosphere. Scientists have bandied about several other ideas concerning the hexagon’s origin. One such idea is that the hexagon arises from a complex interaction between waves undulating through the atmosphere and gas churning up.

    Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

  2. From Universe Today:

    This is great! Blogger Brad Goodspeed created an animation which shows different planets in our solar system as they would appear in the sky if it shared an orbit with our Moon, 380,000 km from earth. On his blog, he said he created it “to make you feel small.” You succeeded, Brad!

    (Source: http)

  3. Rings on the Horizon →