martes, 22 de septiembre de 2015

JUSTO AL FILO ▲ Moons In Hiding | NASA

Moons In Hiding | NASA

Cassini moons

Cassini moons

Cassini moons

Prometheus and Pandora are almost hidden in Saturn's rings in this image.
Prometheus (53 miles or 86 kilometers across) and Pandora (50 miles or 81 kilometers across) orbit along side Saturn's narrow F ring, which is shaped, in part, by their gravitational influences help to shape that ring. Their proximity to the rings also means that they often lie on the same line of sight as the rings, sometimes making them difficult to spot.
In this image, Prometheus is the left most moon in the ring plane, roughly in the center of the image. Pandora is towards the right.
This view looks toward the unilluminated side of the rings from about 0.3 degrees below the ring plane. The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on May 6, 2015.
The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 994,000 miles (1.6 million kilometers) from Prometheus and at a Sun-Prometheus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 106 degrees. Image scale is 6 miles (10 kilometers) per pixel.
The Cassini mission is a cooperative project of NASA, ESA (the European Space Agency) and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov or http://www.nasa.gov/cassini . The Cassini imaging team homepage is at http://ciclops.org .
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute   
Last Updated: Sep. 22, 2015
Editor: Tony Greicius
Saturn and Tethys
Saturn and Tethys
el dispensador dice:
suelo viajar a Saturno,
entre Prometeo y Pandora,
para reconocer que aún existo,
desde luego nadie me ha visto,
porque ser discreto te hace distinto,
habilitándote a pasar desapercibido,
entre sueños y tránsitos requeridos,
porque de eso se trata el universo,
de espiar mientras todo permanece en "lo mismo"...

podría decirse,
sin temor a equivocarse,
que Saturno es un universo en sí mismo,
pero sucede que hay otros simultáneos,
paralelos que nadie ha visto,
y de allí lo sorprendente,
de saber que los ángulos,
comunican mundos donde suenan requintos,
donde las existencias comulgan ante recintos,
donde la oración eleva hasta aquel que no ha entendido...

justo al filo,
navaja de hielo vivo,
flotan mundos existentes,
que se precian por verse existidos,
te ruego los reverencies,
porque ellos honran el futuro que aún no ha sido...

te invito a recorrer,
geometrías y pasillos,
si me ves... tú me saludas...
y te acompaño hasta el portal elegido,
tal vez allí comprendas...
dónde reside el valor,
de reconocerse como existido.
SEPTIEMBRE 22, 2015.-
This July 21, 2015, image from the orbiter's HiRISE camera shows examples within Mars' Valles Marineris.
Among the many discoveries by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter since the mission was launched on Aug. 12, 2005, are seasonal flows on some steep slopes. These flows have a set of characteristics consistent with shallow seeps of salty water.
This July 21, 2015, image from the orbiter's High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera shows examples of these flows on a slope within Coprates Chasma, which is part of the grandest canyon system on Mars, Valles Marineris.  The image covers an area of ground one-third of a mile (536 meters) wide.
These flows are called recurring slope lineae because they fade and disappear during cold seasons and reappear in warm seasons, repeating this pattern every Martian year.  The flows seen in this image are on a north-facing slope, so they are active in northern-hemisphere spring.  The flows emanate from the relatively bright bedrock and flow onto sandy fans, where they are remarkably straight, following linear channels. Valles Marineris contains more of these flows than everywhere else on Mars combined. At any season, some are active, though on different slope aspects at different seasons.  
Future human explorers (and settlers?) will need water to drink, grow food, produce oxygen to breath, and make rocket fuel.  Bringing all of that water from Earth would be extremely expensive, so using water on Mars is essential. Although there is plenty of water ice at high latitudes, surviving the cold winters would be difficult.  An equatorial source of water would be preferable, so Valles Marineris may be the best destination.  However, the chemistry of this water must be understood before betting any lives on it.
For more information about recurring slope lineae, see http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=3981 and  http://www.uahirise.org/sim/2013-12-10/.
The location of the site in this image is 12.9 degrees south latitude, 295.4 degrees east latitude. The image is an excerpt from HiRISE observation ESP_042228_1670.  Other image products from this observation are available at http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_042228_1670 .
HiRISE is one of six instruments on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The University of Arizona, Tucson, operates HiRISE, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colorado. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the orbiter and collaborates with JPL to operate it.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
Last Updated: Aug. 12, 2015
Editor: Tony Greicius

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