Posted on 03/27/2007 11:10:24 AM PDT by anymouse
One of the most bizarre weather patterns known has been photographed at Saturn, where astronomers have spotted a huge, six-sided feature circling the north pole.
Rather than the normally sinuous cloud structures seen on all planets that have atmospheres, this thing is a hexagon.
The honeycomb-like feature has been seen before. NASA's Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft imaged it more than two decades ago. Now, having spotted it with the Cassini spacecraft, scientists conclude it is a long-lasting oddity.
"This is a very strange feature, lying in a precise geometric fashion with six nearly equally straight sides," said Kevin Baines, atmospheric expert and member of Cassini's visual and infrared mapping spectrometer team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "We've never seen anything like this on any other planet. Indeed, Saturn's thick atmosphere, where circularly-shaped waves and convective cells dominate, is perhaps the last place you'd expect to see such a six-sided geometric figure, yet there it is."
The hexagon is nearly 15,000 miles (25,000 kilometers) across. Nearly four Earths could fit inside it. The thermal imagery shows the hexagon extends about 60 miles (100 kilometers) down into the clouds.
At Saturn's south pole, Cassini recently spotted a freaky human eye-like feature that resembles a hurricane.
"It's amazing to see such striking differences on opposite ends of Saturn's poles," said Bob Brown, team leader of the Cassini visual and infrared mapping spectrometer at the University of Arizona. "At the south pole we have what appears to be a hurricane with a giant eye, and at the north pole of Saturn we have this geometric feature, which is completely different."
The hexagon appears to have remained fixed with Saturn's rotation rate and axis since first glimpsed by Voyager 26 years ago. The actual rotation rate of Saturn is still uncertain, which means nobody knows exactly how long the planet's day is.
"Once we understand its dynamical nature, this long-lived, deep-seated polar hexagon may give us a clue to the true rotation rate of the deep atmosphere and perhaps the interior," Baines said.
You'll find this is a normal atmospheric feature due to insolation, atmospheric depth, rotation, and is similar to the jet stream.
An octagon could be done, but the rotation rate or the temperature difference would have to be increased.
George Bush doesn't care about black Saturnians!
Looks like a hubcap from a '67 Chevy C-10 used for BB practice.
Did Al Gore comment on this yet? What does he think?
Is he selling carbon credits in order to save Saturn?
No just six.
Girl Scout cookies and Lent always coincided. They really need to fix that. ;-)
That being said, a few years ago our church starting pushing us to do more spiritual things during Lent instead of giving up sweets or chocolate. (Both my priest and I are chocoholics and suffered during this time.) They encouraged reading a Bible chapter each day or doing a specific good deed each day.
My friends and co-workers rejoiced that I wasn't going to deprive myself of chocolate anymore. LOL
Haha...
yes i am big on doing something affirmative instead of just giving things up, but it is always a good excuse to not consume sweets even if for a short period of time, in my case at least, and so i take advantage of Lent.
Those things congregate off Jupiter...Everybody knows that.
Ieky and Bloupe are trying to signal the space craft.
OK... I got an idea...
First: We get this really, really big Allen wrench...
ARGH!!! Please post a warning when you do that!
To serve man. ;^)
It's a cook book.
It's a cook book.
Did Al Gore comment on this yet? What does he think?
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