Emily Lakdawalla • Dec 22, 2006
CIRS gets another view of Enceladus' south polar hot spot
There's a new image product released from the Composite Infrared Spectrometer (CIRS) on Cassini, an instrument that is capable of measuring the temperatures on the extremely cold surfaces of Saturn's moons and rings, which takes another look at the "hot" spot on Enceladus' south pole.
It always amuses me to call this a "hot" spot because after all it's a "hot" 85 Kelvin, which is minus 188 Celsius or minus 306 Fahrenheit -- not at all hot by our standards! But for a world made of ice orbiting one and a half billion kilometers from the Sun, it's hot.
For comparison to the picture above, here's a view from the Solar System Simulator showing CIRS' point of view on Enceladus when the temperature observation was made.
Let’s Go Beyond The Horizon
Every success in space exploration is the result of the community of space enthusiasts, like you, who believe it is important. You can help usher in the next great era of space exploration with your gift today.
Donate Today