Three half-megameter moons

Filed under pretty pictures, amateur image processing, scale comparisons, Saturn's moons, Mimas, Enceladus, Uranus' moons, Voyager 1 and 2, Cassini

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Large objects in the solar system are round; small objects are lumpy. Where does round transition to lumpy? In the outer solar system, the transition happens at roughly 500 kilometers, give or take. Enceladus (512 kilometers) is geologically active and very round, while Miranda (472 kilometers) and Mimas (397 kilometers) have noticeable departures from roundness.

NASA / JPL / SSI / processing by Gordan Ugarkovic (Enceladus, Mimas) and Ted Stryk (Miranda). Montage by Emily Lakdawalla.

Copyright holder: Ted Stryk

Copyright holder: Emily Lakdawalla

Copyright holder: Gordan Ugarkovic

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Contact us to request publication permission from the copyright holder. Original image data dated on or about August 18, 2012