Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                2020 March 30

                      The Colors of Saturn from Cassini
    Image Credit: NASA, ESA, JPL, ISS, Cassini Imaging Team; Processing &
                            License: Judy Schmidt

   Explanation: What creates Saturn's colors? The featured picture of
   Saturn only slightly exaggerates what a human would see if hovering
   close to the giant ringed world. The image was taken in 2005 by the
   robot Cassini spacecraft that orbited Saturn from 2004 to 2017. Here
   Saturn's majestic rings appear directly only as a curved line,
   appearing brown, in part, from its infrared glow. The rings best show
   their complex structure in the dark shadows they create across the
   upper part of the planet. The northern hemisphere of Saturn can appear
   partly blue for the same reason that Earth's skies can appear blue --
   molecules in the cloudless portions of both planet's atmospheres are
   better at scattering blue light than red. When looking deep into
   Saturn's clouds, however, the natural gold hue of Saturn's clouds
   becomes dominant. It is not known why southern Saturn does not show the
   same blue hue -- one hypothesis holds that clouds are higher there. It
   is also not known why some of Saturn's clouds are colored gold.

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       Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
            NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.
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                             & Michigan Tech. U.

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