Saturn, Cassini image. The planet's rings are seen edge on across centre right (thin line). They are casting shadows over Saturn's northern hemisphere

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Saturn, Cassini image. The planet's rings are seen edge on across centre right (thin line). They are casting shadows over Saturn's northern hemisphere. The varying densities of the rings are responsible for the varying darkness of the shadows. Enceladus, one of Saturn's moons, is seen just above the ringplane (black dot). The Cassini- Huygens spacecraft was launched in 1997 to investigate Saturn, its rings and its moons. This image was taken by Cassini's wide-angle camera on the 16th March 2006 at a distance of million kilometres from Saturn.

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Size: 3000px × 2959px
Photo credit: © NASA/JPL/SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

Keywords: 16, 16/03/2006, 2006, 21st, astronomical, astronomy, camera, cassini, cassini-huygens, century, cosmology, enceladus, exploration, gas, giant, march, moon, planet, planetary, ring, rings, saturn, science, shadow, shadows, solar, space, spacecraft, system, wide-angle