[新闻] “卡西尼”照片显示土星环色彩斑斓（7月22日）[酷图]

“卡西尼”照片显示土星环色彩斑斓
www.XINHUANET.com　　2004年07月23日 12:38:04　　来源：新华网            
       
新华网北京７月２３日电美国科学家２２日说，“卡西尼”号飞船又发回土星的精
彩照片，照片在距土星环下方６４０万公里左右的地方拍摄，清晰地显示了土星环
呈现粉色、灰色和少许淡棕色。

　　 美国宇航局下属的喷气推进实验室在网站上发表新闻公报说，这些彩色照片
是“卡西尼”号飞船
在６月２１日拍摄的，当时它还没有进入土星轨道。土星环内的物质主要是冰，因
此如果构成物质纯度高，环应该是白色的。由此研究人员相信，土星环的“五颜六
色”表示环内有岩石或碳化合物等其他物质的存在。

　　 土星共有７条主环，分别以英文字母Ａ－Ｇ命名，但其位置顺序与字母顺序
无关。此次拍到的新照片中最亮的部分是Ｂ环，这个环宽约２．５万公里，环内有
很多明显地具有沙子颜色的波纹。

　　 美国宇航局称，此前“哈勃”望远镜和“旅行者”号飞船也分别观测到土星
环的各种颜色，其中“旅行者”号飞船先后在１９８０年和１９８１年飞过土星，
但都没有这次“卡西尼”号拍摄的照片清晰。

　　 “卡西尼”号自今年６月３０日进入土星轨道以来，已经发回大量关于土星
的照片。其中，细节清晰的土星“特写”是黑白照片，而鲜明的彩色照片由红外线
照相机拍摄。“卡西尼”号是第一个进入土星轨道的探测器，整个探测计划耗资３
３亿美元，由美国宇航局与欧洲和意大利航天机构联合实施。（完）


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Ringscape In Color
07.22.04

Nine days before it entered orbit, Cassini spacecraft captured this exquisite natural color view of Saturn's rings. The images that make up this composition were obtained from Cassini's vantage point beneath the ring plane with the narrow angle camera on June 21, 2004, at a distance of 6.4 million kilometers (4 million miles) from Saturn. The image scale is 38 kilometers (23 miles) per pixel.

The brightest part of the rings, curving from the upper right to the lower left in the image, is the B ring. Many bands throughout the B ring have a pronounced sandy color. Other color variations across the rings can be seen. Color variations in Saturn's rings have previously been seen in Voyager and Hubble Space Telescope images. Cassini's images show that color variations in the rings are more pronounced in this viewing geometry than they are when seen from Earth.

Saturn's rings are made primarily of water ice. Since pure water ice is white, it is believed that different colors in the rings reflect different amounts of contamination by other materials such as rock or carbon compounds. In conjunction with information from other Cassini instruments, Cassini images will help scientists determine the composition of different parts of Saturn's ring system.

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 Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.

For more information, about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit, http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and the Cassini imaging team home page, http://ciclops.org.

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