Strange persistent feature in Saturn's atmosphere

[x-y-no]

This is pretty interesting. The Cassini probe has imaged a persistent hexagonal feature in Saturn's north polar atmosphere:



The feature is approximately 25,000 kilometers across and extends at least 100 kilometers deep into the atmosphere.

The hexagonal feature was originally detected during NASA's Voyager flybys of the early 1980's, so has apparently persisted for at least a few decades.

No similar feature exists in the south polar region, nor as far as we know on any other planet.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press-release-details.cfm?newsID=735

[Lindaloo]

That is not a meteor is it?

[x-y-no]

That is not a meteor is it?

No, that's the north pole of Saturn. The image is infrared (it's night-time in Saturn's north polar region - 15 Earth year nights there.)

The hexagon is an entirely atmospheric feature. The question is, what the heck could cause such a thing?

[Aquawind]

That is pretty wild.. Reminds me of the cloud formations inside of the hurricane eye. At such a large scale and long period of time it is pretty interesting. I assume the hexagon rotates as well. Funky

The southern pole does look like a cane..well Catagory 10 more like.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press-r ... newsID=703

[Stephanie]

That is pretty wild.. Reminds me of the cloud formations inside of the hurricane eye. At such a large scale and long period of time it is pretty interesting. I assume the hexagon rotates as well. Funky

The southern pole does look like a cane..well Catagory 10 more like.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press-r ... newsID=703

I'm waiting for that "eye" to blink!

[x-y-no]

That is pretty wild.. Reminds me of the cloud formations inside of the hurricane eye. At such a large scale and long period of time it is pretty interesting. I assume the hexagon rotates as well. Funky

The southern pole does look like a cane..well Catagory 10 more like.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press-r ... newsID=703

Yes, I thought of the patterns that occasionally appear in the eye of a hurricane too. But I'm totally clueless as to whether some similar mechanism could be responsible.

[JonathanBelles]

are you sure thats in the atmosphere? It almost looks like saturn was hit by a very large object and all the land was pushed out. Then the land stoped moving and left that strange feature.

[x-y-no]

are you sure thats in the atmosphere? It almost looks like saturn was hit by a very large object and all the land was pushed out. Then the land stoped moving and left that strange feature.

All we ever see of Saturn is its upper atmosphere (the atmosphere is a couple of hundred kilometers thick and quite hazy.) And there really isn't "land" in the sense we think of on Earth. There's probably a small solid core, but most of the planet is ice.

[Aquawind]

are you sure thats in the atmosphere? It almost looks like saturn was hit by a very large object and all the land was pushed out. Then the land stoped moving and left that strange feature.

I am assuming it does rotate. It is amazing that the atmosphere can be that constant and stable to have the symetric formation persist. The only constant I can think of is gravity other than a surface feature.

[Terrell]

That's a pretty cool feature on Saturn. Of the 8 planets in the Solar System he's definitely one of the most interesting ones, he just got another reason to be interesting. I wonder what future missions NASA will send to Saturn after Cassini. They almost certainly will want to get more looks at Saturn and his 50 or so moons, even after Cassini. Uranus and Neptune probably won't get visited again for a while, since Saturn and Jupiter steal the show out there as do their moons. A gravity whip from Jupiter may also be necessary to send a orbiter to Uranus or Neptune as well, at least on any reasonable time scale.

[kevin]

One day I hope to be the first Kevin to get blown around at 1000mph on Saturn while eating an ice cream cone.

[Terrell]

are you sure thats in the atmosphere? It almost looks like saturn was hit by a very large object and all the land was pushed out. Then the land stoped moving and left that strange feature.

All we ever see of Saturn is its upper atmosphere (the atmosphere is a couple of hundred kilometers thick and quite hazy.) And there really isn't "land" in the sense we think of on Earth. There's probably a small solid core, but most of the planet is ice.

Most of Saturn is gas, especially Hydrogen.

Saturn's Composition and Atmosphere

[Lindaloo]

That is not a meteor is it?

No, that's the north pole of Saturn. The image is infrared (it's night-time in Saturn's north polar region - 15 Earth year nights there.)

The hexagon is an entirely atmospheric feature. The question is, what the heck could cause such a thing?

I dunno but I have to admit it has my attention. It is actually quite pretty.

[Stephanie]

It is very pretty.