[meteorite-list] Epimetheus Revealed

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2008 14:00:28 -0800 (PST)
Message-ID: <200801112200.OAA14199_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/image-details.cfm?imageID=2920

Epimetheus Revealed
January 11, 2008

Full-Res: PIA09813
<http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA09813>

The Cassini spacecraft's close flyby of Epimetheus in December 2007
returned detailed images of the moon's south polar region.

The view shows what might be the remains of a large impact crater
covering most of this face, and which could be responsible for the
somewhat flattened shape of the southern part of Epimetheus (116
kilometers, or 72 miles across) seen previously at much lower resolution.

The image also shows two terrain types: darker, smoother areas, and
brighter, slightly more yellowish, fractured terrain. One interpretation
of this image is that the darker material evidently moves down slopes,
and probably has a lower ice content than the brighter material, which
appears more like "bedrock." Nonetheless, materials in both terrains are
likely to be rich in water ice.

The images that were used to create this enhanced color view were taken
with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Dec. 3, 2007. The
views were obtained at a distance of approximately 37,400 kilometers
(23,000 miles) from Epimetheus and at a Sun-Epimetheus-spacecraft, or
phase, angle of 65 degrees. Image scale is 224 meters (735 feet) per pixel.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, 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, D.C. 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, Colo.

For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov . The Cassini imaging team homepage is at
http://ciclops.org .

Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Received on Fri 11 Jan 2008 05:00:28 PM PST