* Astronomy

Cassini captured Saturn's south polar region and the tiny icy moon Mimas on the left.
This view looks toward the lit side of the rings from about 28 degrees below the ring plane.


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Credit NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Images taken using red, green and blue spectral filters were combined to create this colour view. The view was acquired with the wide-angle camera on Feb. 20, 2007, at a distance of approximately 1 million kilometres from Saturn. Image scale is 58 kilometres per pixel.

This extreme false-colour view of Mimas shows colour variation across the moon's surface.
To create this false-colour view, ultraviolet, green and infrared images were combined into a single picture that isolates and maps regional colour differences. This "colour map" was then superimposed onto a clear-filter image that preserves the relative brightness across the body.
The combination of colour map and brightness image shows how colours vary across Mimas' surface, and in particular, between the terrain on the extreme right side of this view and the rest of the surface. The origin of the colour differences is not yet understood, but may be caused by subtle differences in the surface composition between the two terrains.


Credit: NASA/JPL/GSFC/Southwest Research Institute

The view is toward the southern hemisphere on the anti-Saturn side of Mimas.
The images were taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Nov. 20, 2006 at a distance of approximately 150,000 kilometres from Mimas. Image scale is 898 metres per pixel.

This view shows the Saturn-facing hemisphere of Mimas. North is up and rotated 24 degrees to the left. The moon's night side is dimly lit by Saturnshine, which is sunlight reflected by the planet.



The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Sept. 25, 2006 at a distance of approximately 552,000 kilometres from Mimas and at a Sun-Mimas-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 106 degrees. Image scale is 3 kilometres per pixel.

The bright, steep walls of the enormous crater, Herschel (130 kilometres wide), gleam in the sunlight on Mimas.


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Credit NASA

The lit terrain seen here is on the leading hemisphere of Mimas (397 kilometres across). North is up.
The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Aug. 16, 2006 at a distance of approximately 221,000 kilometres from Mimas and at a Sun-Mimas-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 80 degrees. Image scale is 1 kilometre per pixel.